Spatial Variation in Agricultural BMPs and Relationships with Nutrient Yields Across New York State Waterways

Abstract

Abstract Agricultural nutrients nitrogen and phosphorus can subsequently be transported to waterways and are often managed through adoption of best management practices (BMPs). However, we have a poor understanding of how the use of BMPs varies spatially and how BMP adoption might be related to nutrient loads in surface waters. To address this, we performed a survey of agricultural landowners across New York State and compared this with estimates of annual incremental nitrogen and phosphorus loads of agricultural origin from the Spatially Referenced Regressions On Watershed attributes (SPARROW) model. Using these sociobehavioral data and SPARROW predictions, we perform colocation analysis to identify areas where watersheds with high nutrient yield from agriculture are collocated with non-use of agricultural BMPs. This colocation analysis offers a novel methodology for identifying areas where monitoring of waterways and promotion of best management practices could be targeted to achieve the greatest benefits.