Managing agricultural watersheds in an environmentally friendly manner necessitate the strategic implementation of well-targeted sustainable land management (SLM) practices that limit soil and nonpoint source pollution losses and translocation. Watershed-scale SLM-scenario modeling has the potential to identify efficient and effective management strategies from the field to the integrated landscape level. In a case study targeting a 66-hectare watershed in Petzenkirchen, Lower Austria, the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) was utilized to evaluate a variety of locally adoptable SLM practices. SWAT was calibrated and validated (monthly) at the catchment outlet for flow, sediment, nitrate-nitrogen (NO3\uffe2\uff80\uff93N), ammonium nitrogen (NH4\uffe2\uff80\uff93N), and mineralized phosphorus (PO4\uffe2\uff80\uff93P) using SWATplusR. Considering the locally existing agricultural practices and socioeconomic and environmental factors of the research area, four conservation practices were evaluated: baseline scenario, contour farming (CF), winter cover crops (CC), and a combination of no-till and cover crops (NT\uffe2\uff80\uff89+\uffe2\uff80\uff89CC). The NT\uffe2\uff80\uff89+\uffe2\uff80\uff89CC SLM practice was found to be the most effective soil conservation practice in reducing soil loss by around 80%, whereas CF obtained the best results for decreasing the nutrient loads of NO3\uffe2\uff80\uff93N and PO4\uffe2\uff80\uff93P by 11% and 35%, respectively. The findings of this study imply that the setup SWAT model can serve the context-specific performance assessment and eventual promotion of SLM interventions that mitigate on-site land degradation and the consequential off-site environmental pollution resulting from agricultural nonpoint sources.Abstract. Andean headwater catchments are an important source of freshwater for downstream water users. However, few long-term studies exist on the relative importance of climate change and direct anthropogenic perturbations on flow regimes in these catchments. In this paper, we assess change in streamflow based on long time series of hydrometeorological data (1974\uffe2\uff80\uff932008) and land cover reconstructions (1963\uffe2\uff80\uff932009) in the Pangor catchment (282 km2) located in the tropical Andes. Three main land cover change trajectories can be distinguished during the period 1963\uffe2\uff80\uff932009: (1) expansion of agricultural land by an area equal to 14 % of the catchment area (or 39 km2) in 46 years' time, (2) deforestation of native forests by 11 % (or \uffe2\uff88\uff9231 km2) corresponding to a mean rate of 67 ha yr\uffe2\uff88\uff921, and (3) afforestation with exotic species in recent years by about 5 % (or 15 km2). Over the time period 1963\uffe2\uff80\uff932009, about 50 % of the 64 km2 of native forests was cleared and converted to agricultural land. Given the strong temporal variability of precipitation and streamflow data related to El Ni\uffc3\uffb1o\uffe2\uff80\uff93Southern Oscillation, we use empirical mode decomposition techniques to detrend the time series. The long-term increasing trend in rainfall is remarkably different from the observed changes in streamflow, which exhibit a decreasing trend. Hence, observed changes in streamflow are not the result of long-term change in precipitation but very likely result from anthropogenic disturbances associated with land cover change.
", "keywords": ["Technology", "Period (music)", "0208 environmental biotechnology", "Urban Flooding", "Precipitation", "02 engineering and technology", "Oceanography", "Environmental technology. Sanitary engineering", "land-use change", "Geography. Anthropology. Recreation", "Climate change", "GE1-350", "TD1-1066", "Water Science and Technology", "Climatology", "2. Zero hunger", "Global and Planetary Change", "Geography", "Ecology", "T", "Physics", "Hydrology (agriculture)", "Geology", "Programming language", "Hydrological Modeling and Water Resource Management", "Physical Sciences", "Cartography", "Land cover", "1443", "Hydrometeorology", "Drainage basin", "0207 environmental engineering", "Streamflow", "Environmental science", "G", "Global Flood Risk Assessment and Management", "Meteorology", "Afforestation", "Agroforestry", "Biology", "Land use", " land-use change and forestry", "FOS: Earth and related environmental sciences", "Acoustics", "15. Life on land", "Computer science", "Environmental sciences", "Geotechnical engineering", "Deforestation (computer science)", "13. Climate action", "FOS: Biological sciences", "Environmental Science", "Global Drought Monitoring and Assessment", "Land use"]}, "links": [{"href": "https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-4201-2015"}, {"rel": "related", "href": "https://repository.soilwise-he.eu/cat/collections/metadata:main/items/Hydrology%20and%20Earth%20System%20Sciences", "name": "related record", "description": "related record", "type": "application/json"}, {"rel": "self", "type": "application/geo+json", "title": "10.5194/hess-19-4201-2015", "name": "item", "description": "10.5194/hess-19-4201-2015", "href": "https://repository.soilwise-he.eu/cat/collections/metadata:main/items/10.5194/hess-19-4201-2015"}, {"rel": "collection", "type": "application/json", "title": "Collection", "name": "collection", "description": "Collection", "href": "https://repository.soilwise-he.eu/cat/collections/metadata:main"}], "time": {"date": "2015-10-20T00:00:00Z"}}, {"id": "PMC10039844", "type": "Feature", "geometry": null, "properties": {"updated": "2026-05-24T16:27:04Z", "type": "Journal Article", "created": "2023-03-25", "title": "Evaluating the impacts of sustainable land management practices on water quality in an agricultural catchment in Lower Austria using SWAT", "description": "AbstractManaging agricultural watersheds in an environmentally friendly manner necessitate the strategic implementation of well-targeted sustainable land management (SLM) practices that limit soil and nonpoint source pollution losses and translocation. Watershed-scale SLM-scenario modeling has the potential to identify efficient and effective management strategies from the field to the integrated landscape level. In a case study targeting a 66-hectare watershed in Petzenkirchen, Lower Austria, the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) was utilized to evaluate a variety of locally adoptable SLM practices. SWAT was calibrated and validated (monthly) at the catchment outlet for flow, sediment, nitrate-nitrogen (NO3\uffe2\uff80\uff93N), ammonium nitrogen (NH4\uffe2\uff80\uff93N), and mineralized phosphorus (PO4\uffe2\uff80\uff93P) using SWATplusR. Considering the locally existing agricultural practices and socioeconomic and environmental factors of the research area, four conservation practices were evaluated: baseline scenario, contour farming (CF), winter cover crops (CC), and a combination of no-till and cover crops (NT\uffe2\uff80\uff89+\uffe2\uff80\uff89CC). The NT\uffe2\uff80\uff89+\uffe2\uff80\uff89CC SLM practice was found to be the most effective soil conservation practice in reducing soil loss by around 80%, whereas CF obtained the best results for decreasing the nutrient loads of NO3\uffe2\uff80\uff93N and PO4\uffe2\uff80\uff93P by 11% and 35%, respectively. The findings of this study imply that the setup SWAT model can serve the context-specific performance assessment and eventual promotion of SLM interventions that mitigate on-site land degradation and the consequential off-site environmental pollution resulting from agricultural nonpoint sources.