Modelling potential manure transport from permitted livestock facilities, Maumee watershed

Session: Soil Health: Role on Nutrient Losses from Agricultural Soils (2)

Patrick Lawrence, University of Toledo, [email protected]
Edwina Teye, University of Toledo, [email protected]
Peter Lindquist, University of Toledo, [email protected]

Abstract

Concentrated Animal Feeding Facilities (CAFFs) have become a somewhat permanent feature in the agricultural setting of the United States in recent years with about 16,554 facilities (estimated in 2013). Advocates hail it as an economically viable option for raising animals for food, thus becoming a low cost source for meat, milk and eggs. While described as economically viable operations, there are growing concerns over the and environmental implications associated with the practice. Concerns include potential contamination of surrounding water bodies from runoff from land applied manure from CAFFs from over-application on adjacent farmland. Considerable debate has centered around the potential water quality impacts from CAFFs in the Western Lake Erie Basin and Maumee watershed in Ohio, including recent studies mapping their location and suggesting that they are major source nutrients into Lake Erie, although understanding of the scale of farmland application of manure from CAFFs is largely unknown.  The aim of this project is to model the potential transportation and application of manure from 29 permitted CAFFS within the Western Lake Erie Basin to assess the amount manure could be distributed across the watershed in to better understand potential impacts to water quality including nutrient loading into the lake.