Drainage Water Management for Midwestern Row Crop Agriculture

Drainage water management uses water control structures to raise the effective height of the water table, thereby managing the amount of drainage from a field. DWM is a practice that shows great promise for reducing nitrate loading in the Midwest while maintaining drainage intensity during critical periods of the crop production cycle. This project demonstrated the impact of managing water table depths to reduce nutrient transport from subsurface drains during the fallow season and to reduce water deficit stress during the growing season. Changing the stop logs in the DWM control structure during the year is subject to the timing of the spring field operations and completion of fall field work. NRCS Practice 554 specifies a 30-day window for changes in the water table levels. All of the field evaluations were operated like the producers' normal farming operations with the exception of managing the control structures in the drainage systems.