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Map of the route of the newly discovered Roman road from Wixoe to Sible Hedingham and ultimately, probably, to Braintree. These structures were mostly of mid-third century date, but had possibly continued in use from the mid-/late first to mid-second century a.d.[14] (4) B Thorpe St Andrew b , I plot 16a, The Oaks, Harvey Lane i (TG 2542 0872): archaeological monitoring during the construction of a new house uncovered several early Romano-British settlement features, comprising ditches, pits and the bases of two oven-like features. (1) B Colchester b , I 60 Creffield Road i (TL 98702 24712): the Colchester to Gosbecks Roman road was projected to run through the site, which is also within a Roman cemetery area, and the road was identified in 2019. The alignment of the road indicates that it formed a junction with the Chesterford to Dunmow Roman road (Margary 300) just to the north of the present-day crossroads in the village, close to the village school (TL 60662 37362).[11] Graph: FIG. [Extracted from the article]

(1) B Caversham b , I 177 Upper Woodcote Road i (SU 69675 76225): excavation revealed Roman occupation, including both early (first- to second-century) and late Roman (fourth-century) elements. (4) B Wootton b , I Lydden Hill race circuit i (TR 2400 4700): evaluation revealed Roman ditches, gullies and pits. Besides pottery, two Roman coins were found, as well as animal bones and ceramic building material.[1] EAST SUSSEX (1) B Icklesham b , I land at Main Road i (TQ 8645 1623): excavation investigated ditches, gullies, pits and a cremation burial inside a square-ditched enclosure. [Extracted from the article]

About 215 billion cubic metres of water has been consumed by large and medium-sized irrigation districts in recent years, particularly over 35% quantity of the total water consumption in China. The irrigation district has been the main field of agricultural water-saving construction. Therefore, it is necessary to accurately assess the water-saving level in modern irrigation districts. In this study, an index system was established to evaluate the water-saving level in large-scale irrigation districts. Five aspects were considered, including engineering water-saving, farmland water-saving, water use management, water resources protection, and water use benefit. Eight standards were selected, such as measurability, vulnerability, predictability, typicality, controllability, integrity, responsiveness, and stability. A screening model was constructed to identify the indexes to be shortlisted or not. Subsequently, 23 indexes from the 70 primary indexes, 86.42% of the information was expressed by 32.86% of the elementary indexes, indicating the concise and adequate index system. The final indexes were formed, including the backbone canal lining ratio, the completion rate of engineering projects, backbone canal intact rate, backbone hydraulic structures intact percentage, water utilization coefficient of canal system, high-efficient water-saving irrigation coverage percentage, field water utilization coefficient, multi-cropping index, gross irrigation water consumption per mu, real collection rate of water charges, water user association coverage rate, allocation rate of water measuring equipment on lateral gate, 2 fees implementation rate, number of management personnel per 10 000 mu, proportion of management personnel with junior college degree or above, informationization coverage rate, proportion of irrigation water in total water consumption, drainage ditch intact rate, water ecological monitoring system coverage rate, proportion of ecological water in the total water consumption, grain yield produced by 1m³ irrigation water, proportion of primary industry production in irrigation district, and water consumption per-10 000-yuan-GDP. Four large-scale irrigation districts (Qucun, Penglou, Guangli, and Dagong) are all located along the Yellow River in Henan Province. The indexe system was then investigated empirically to determine the water-saving level. The water-saving level indexes for the four objective Irrigation Districts were 0.666 (Qucun), 0.730 (Penglou), 0.657 (Guangli), and 0.616 (Dagong), respectively. On the whole, the score of the water-saving level index was ranked in the descending order of Penglou, Qucun, Guangli, and Dagong. The scores of the 5 secondary indexes showed that Penglou achieved the best effect of engineering water-saving, whereas, Dagong was a negative example. This was due to the well-matched infrastructure engineering, where the backbone canal system was of systematic construction and renovation in the past 10 years. Guangli performed relatively lower than the rest because the high-efficient coverage percentage of water-saving irrigation was rather weak and the gross consumption of irrigation water per mu was pretty high, particularly for the long-term goals of farmland water-saving. There was no significant difference in the score of water use management level among the four irrigation districts, but their agriculture water rate, water user association promotion, and water measuring facilities setting, all needed to be rather improved. Water resources protection was the common weakness of the four irrigation districts, indicating the concept of project construction without considering ecological protection over the past years. Consequently, five recommendations can be addressed to further improve the water-saving level in the irrigation districts. 1) To coordinate the backbone and field construction, 2) To establish the new water-saving system under the agricultural water price reform, 3) To strengthen the dredging and transformation of drainage ditches, 4) To improve the water resources and environment monitoring network, 5) To promote the efficient saving on water irrigation, particularly for the planting area of cash crops. The findings can provide an effective way to scientifically evaluate the water-saving construction in large-scale irrigation districts, thereby promoting the process of agricultural water-saving in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inland waters play an active role in the global carbon cycle and emit large volumes of the greenhouse gases (GHGs), methane (CH4) and carbon dioxide (CO2). A considerable body of research has improved emissions estimates from lakes, reservoirs and rivers but recent attention has been drawn to the importance of small, artificial waterbodies as poorly quantified but potentially important emission hotspots. Of particular interest are emissions from drainage ditches and constructed ponds. These waterbody types are prevalent in many landscapes and their cumulative surface areas can be substantial. Furthermore, GHG emissions from constructed waterbodies are anthropogenic in origin and form part of national emissions reporting, whereas emissions from natural waterbodies do not (according to Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change guidelines). Here, we present GHG data from two complementary studies covering a range of land uses. In the first, we measured emissions from nine ponds and seven ditches over a full year. Annual emissions varied considerably: 0.1–44.3 g CH4 m−2 year−1 and −36–4421 g CO2 m−2 year−1. In the second, we measured GHG concentrations in 96 ponds and 64 ditches across seven countries, covering subtropical, temperate and sub‐arctic biomes. When CH4 emissions were converted to CO2 equivalents, 93% of waterbodies were GHG sources. In both studies, GHGs were positively related to nutrient status (C, N, P), and pond GHG concentrations were highest in smallest waterbodies. Ditch and pond emissions were larger per unit area when compared to equivalent natural systems (streams, natural ponds). We show that GHG emissions from natural systems should not be used as proxies for those from artificial waterbodies, and that artificial waterbodies have the potential to make a substantial but largely unquantified contribution to emissions from the Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Use sector, and the global carbon cycle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Severe non-point source pollution has widely resulted from the nitrogen losses in paddy-field drainage in southern China, due mainly to excessive application of chemical fertilizers and unreasonable irrigation. The goal of this study was to improve the water use efficiency, while mitigating the reactive nitrogen losses in paddy fields. A controlled drainage system (CD) was designed to combine the subsurface pipe and open drainage ditches, with an open-ditch controlled drainage system (OD) as a control group. Specifically, the CD system consisted of a controlled drainage ditch and three field plots (CD1, CD2, and CD3) with a controlled subsurface pipe. By contrast, the three-field plots (OD1, OD2, and OD3) were free subsurface pipes in the OD system, where the field water freely drained into the drainage ditch through lateral infiltration. The drainage intensity and nitrogen concentration were monitored in various forms at the outlets of subsurface pipe and open ditch with a high frequency in six selected irrigation-induced drainage events, including three irrigation-drainage events with the fertilization (F1, F2, and F3) and three irrigation-drainage events without fertilization (D1, D2, and D3). The results showed that the drainage loss induced by six irrigation-drainage events accounted for 44.0% of the total amount of irrigation water in the OD system, indicating low water use efficiency. The combination of controlled drainage between the subsurface pipe and the open ditch greatly changed the drainage from the paddy field to the open ditch in the CD system. In all irrigation-drainage events except F3, the start time of open ditch drainage was later than that of subsurface pipe drainage, whereas, the peak of the intensity in the open ditch drainage was synchronized or significantly later than that of subsurface pipe drainage. Furthermore, the drainage peak and intensity of the open ditch in the CD system were much lower than those in the OD system among all six irrigation-drainage events. Specifically, the drainage peak of the latter was 1.3 to 8.2-fold that of the former, where the average drainage intensity was 1.5 to 4.4-fold. Compared with the OD, the CD decreased the drainage peak, intensity, duration time, as well as total drainage loss, where the proportion of drainage amount in the total amount of irrigation water dropped to 24.4%, indicating an effective role in drainage mitigation. In the irrigation-drainage event F1, F2, and F3, the concentrations of ammonium (NH4+) and total nitrogen (TN) in the drainage from the outlets of subsurface pipe (CD1, CD2, and CD3) and open ditches (CD and OD) gradually increased over time until the end of the drainage. Nevertheless, the concentrations of NH4+, nitrate (NO3-), and TN in the drainage from these same outlets gradually increased over time in the irrigation-drainage events D1, D2, and D3. Furthermore, the average concentrations of NH4+, NO3- and TN in the drainage from F1, F2, and F3 were much higher than those from D1, D2, and D3, indicating that the nitrogen loss was effectively reduced during the drainage management in a certain period after fertilization. As such, the open ditch in the CD system significantly intercepted a large number of nitrogen loads from subsurface pipe drainages. The nitrogen losses in the forms of NH4+, NO3- and TN from open ditch drainage in the CD system greatly decreased by 42.6%, 70.7%, and 39.3%, respectively, compared with the OD system. Consequently, the CD system can be expected to significantly reduce drainage loss and control non-point source pollution. This finding can also provide promising drainage control for the paddy field in southern China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the case of roadways, although numerous observations have confirmed that environmental longitudinal cracks induced by expansive clay subgrades often develop at the edge of a roadway, the actual location of such cracks may occur at locations within the roadway. These moisture pathways further contribute to moisture increase in the underlying expansive clay subgrade, ultimately triggering additional longitudinal cracks and uneven roadway deformations. Moisture sensors in the subgrade of a FM2 test section: (a) layout of horizontal moisture sensor array; and (b) moisture content isochrones. [Extracted from the article]

Parameters as well as their corresponding reference values, adopted to control the compaction quality during the construction of High-speed Rail(HSR) embankments in different countries are summarised in this paper. Different measurement methods for the degree of compaction are analysed with the comparison of the features of various plate loading tests. To investigate the relationships between different compaction control parameters, we conducted in-situ compaction tests on three particular subdivisional railway earthworks at Zhangjiakou-Datong HSR and Inner Mongolia-Jiangxi Railway: a bridge foundation pit below the embankment-bridge transition section, a geogrid-reinforced cushion above embankment foundation, and an excavated channel for drainage ditch. We investigate the relations of the Dynamic Deformation Modulus (Evd) versus the Reaction Modulus (K30), Evd versus the compaction coefficient (K) by analysing the measured data. The analysis result shows good linear correlations between Evd and K30, as well as Evd and K. Based on the analysis performed in this paper combined with our engineering practices, recommended reference values of the compaction control indicators for bridge foundation pit below a transition section and the bottoms of drainage ditches are also proposed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Post‐mining freshwater habitats can serve as secondary habitats for threatened species. Being globally plentiful, their efficient restoration should be based on detailed evidence, especially under the current global decline of freshwater biodiversity. Synthetic studies focusing on the effects of restoration on freshwater communities are surprisingly rare, even for the most common restoration approaches. Such a lack of evidence limits the efficiency of habitat restoration in post‐mining landscapes.We combined a landscape‐scale field study of aquatic beetles and hemipterans in 29 freshwater pools at lignite spoil heaps in Czechia with a comparative synthesis of all 14 available datasets on freshwater communities at habitats created by coal mining in Central Europe. We compared the diversity and conservation value of freshwater habitats created by the main restoration approaches, including technical reclamation, spontaneous succession and their combination. Additionally, we analysed the detailed influence of key habitat descriptors on their conservation potential.Communities of aquatic beetles and hemipterans had more species in spontaneously and semi‐spontaneously developed pools, which were also preferred by more red‐listed species of both studied groups. The reviewed studies showed the same trend for amphibians, odonates, dipterans and macrozoobenthos, although some technically created pools and drainage ditches harboured some threatened species of aquatic plants, odonates and macrozoobenthos as well.Relatively independent of the restoration approach, the conservation value of freshwater communities was related to the particular characteristics of the restored habitats. The key beneficial features were as follows: smaller area of restored water bodies, heterogeneous littoral vegetation with suppressed dominants, heterogeneous bottom substrate with low and gradually sloping banks, absence of fish, sun‐exposed water surface and some forests in the surroundings.Synthesis and applications. Efficient restoration of freshwater habitats at post‐mining landscapes can create important secondary refuges for threatened and common species. Freshwater communities of high conservation value can be supported by all main restoration approaches if heterogeneous habitats are created. A combination of technical reclamation with spontaneous succession seems to be the most efficient approach to maximise biodiversity in freshwater habitats at coal‐mining spoil heaps. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

C²AST (Critical and Cultural Approaches to Ambitious Science Teaching): From Responsive Teaching Toward Developing Culturally and Linguistically Sustaining Science Teaching Practices Conclusion As science classrooms are becoming increasingly diverse-linguistically, racially, and socioeconomically-science instruction needs to support the honoring and continued strengthening of students' varied identities (NRC 2012). Educators must consider how K-12 science can be transformed to provide a vision of hope and educational justice. Invite students to use translanguaging (Suárez 2018) as productive sensemaking in classrooms; challenge students to think about how they use language in science; and avoid front-loading vocabulary, which sends the message that there is "a right way" to use language in science classrooms (Suárez et al. 2019). [Extracted from the article]

The study aims to highlight the continuous postcolonial psychological violence inflicted on the proletariat class, and their perpetual struggle to cope up with their new and past traumatic histories, which shape their current positions, behavior, and relationships. Jazz is a novel about the fractured psyche of all main characters, who are suffering at two ends, one because of their pre-migration violent violence, and secondly, their post-migration miserable struggle as second class citizens. It exposes their useless struggles to lift up their status and ultimately self-respect, which all go in vain, due to the White hegemony. Past memories haunt these characters and propel them to destroy their relationships, and behave abnormally in their new lives. The study is studied under the theory of Karl Marx's theory of capitalism and Cathy Crauth theory of trauma in migrated second class citizens. It is concluded that Black’s abnormal behavior is the trace of White’s violence and their past traumas are transgenerational due to their untiring permanent sufferings. Moreover, the label of the second class citizen can never be easily tagged off. The working-class lives in the same ditch. For them, freedom means, replacement of old masters with new ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of the study was to assess the P-PO4 and N-NH4 pollution of water in grasslands located on peat soils and to identify the impact of groundwater level on this pollution formation. The research was conducted in 2000– 2010 on grounds of ITP-PIB in Biebrza village (Poland). Within lowland fen a total of 18 monitoring points of groundwater and watercourses were established in 6 separate test stands. The subject of the research was water collected from drainage ditches/channels and groundwater, which was taken from wells installed in organic-soil layer and wells whose bottom was 15–20 cm below this layer. Water samples were collected several times a year, and in the case of groundwater, its level was also measured. It was found that: 1) due to concentration level of P-PO4 and N-NH4, about 46 and 39% of water samples from organic-soil layer and more than 40 and 37% of water samples from mineralorganic-soil layer respectively, were characterized by poor chemical status; 2) due to the exceeding of the limit values of P-PO4 and N-NH4 concentration, water samples from watercourses in over 30 and 27% respectively were not within 1st and 2nd class of surface water quality; 3) P-PO4 and N-NH4 concentrations in each water type were statistically significant and positively correlated with each other; 4) in organic-soil layer the groundwater level changing every 10 cm was a statistically significant factor differentiating the average P-PO4 concentration in groundwater associated with mineral-organic layer of peat soil and average N-NH4 concentration in each type of water. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Agro-Environment Science is the property of Journal of Agro-Environment Science Editorial Board and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The ecological and health risks posed by wastes discharged from mining areas to the environment and human health has aroused concern. 114 soil samples were collected from nine areas of long-term mine waste land in northwestern Yunnan to assess the pollution characteristics, ecological and health risks of heavy metals. The result revealed that the geo-accumulation indexes were Cd (4.00) > Pb (3.18) > Zn (1.87) > Cu (0.25). Semi-variance analysis revealed that Cd and Cu showed moderate spatial dependency, whereas Pb and Zn showed strong spatial dependency. Cd posed an extreme potential ecological risk. Slopes and ditches were extreme potential ecological risk areas. Non-carcinogenic risk to children from Pb and Carcinogenic risk to adult and children from Cd was non-negligible and direct ingestion was the major source. This study provided a scientific basis for policymakers in management and exposure reduction.

Emerging aquatic insects constitute one of the main biological flows connecting aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. In a landscape, there are many sources of emergence, which vary in space and time. Thus, they must be clearly defined when studying the inland dispersal of aquatic insects. In this study, we defined five types of hydrographic networks (including or not including ponds and ditches) on the basis of cartographic data of varying degrees of detail (from OpenStreetMap to field map) in order to explain the abundance of aquatic insects. We sampled Ephemeroptera, Plecoptera, Trichoptera, and Megaloptera (ETPM) with 64 sticky traps homogeneously covering a 75 ha agricultural landscape. The abundance of aquatic insects is logically better explained by the hydrographic networks recorded directly in the field than by the reference network, which is incomplete (OpenStreetMap). The results show that, depending on the sampling period, not all water bodies in the landscape are necessarily sources of emergence. To our knowledge, the issue of defining the sources of emerging aquatic insects has never been raised. Based on a practical example, this short note shows that, by refining the hydrographic network to better match the sources of emergence, the explanatory power of inland aquatic insect abundance can be greatly improved.

Background: Malaria is often persistent in communities surrounded by mosquito breeding habitats. Anopheles gambiae sensu lato exploit a variety of aquatic habitats, but the biotic determinants of its preferences are poorly understood. This study aimed to identify and quantify macroinvertebrates in different habitat types with determined water physico-chemical parameters to establish those preferred by An. gambiae s.l. larvae as well as their predators and competitors. Methods: A field survey was conducted in Kibuye and Kayonjo villages located in the vicinity of the River Sezibwa, north-eastern Uganda to identify Anopheline larval habitats shared by aquatic insects. Habitats were geo-recorded and as streams, ponds, temporary pools and roadside ditches. From October to December 2017, random microhabitats/quadrats were selected from each habitat type, their water physico-chemical parameters (electrical conductivity, total dissolved solids, temperature and pH) were measured, and they were sampled for macroinvertebrates using standard dippers. All collected arthropod macroinvertebrates were then morphologically identified to family level and enumerated. Results: Principal component analysis showed that the four larval habitat types were characterized by distinct physico-chemical parameter profiles. Ponds and streams had the highest number and diversity of macroinvertebrate insect taxa and sustained few An. gambiae s.l. larvae. Anopheles gambiae s.l. were more common in roadside ditches and particularly abundant in temporary pools which it commonly shared with Dytiscidae (predaceous diving beetles) and Culex spp. Cluster correlation analysis conducted on the abundance of these taxa within quadrats suggested that An. gambiae s.l. and Dytiscidae have the most similar patterns of microhabitat use, followed by Cybaeidae (water spiders). Whilst Culex spp. co-occurred with An. gambiae s.l. in some habitats, there was only partial niche overlap and no clear evidence of competition between the two mosquito taxa. Conclusions: Ponds and streams are habitats that host the largest diversity and abundance of aquatic insect taxa. Anopheles gambiae s.l. larvae distinctively preferred temporary pools and roadside ditches, where they were exposed to few predators and no apparent competition by Culex spp. Further studies should aim to test the impact of Dytiscidae and Cybaeidae on An. gambiae s.l. dynamics experimentally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tunnel excavation in mountainous region frequently encounters high local inflows as a consequence of hydraulic head and multiple faults geology, which may adversely affect the serviceability of tunnel structures. Previous researches, however, paid very little attention to the seepage field of rocks around deep buried tunnels adjacent to water-bearing faults under high hydraulic head. In this paper, a new close-form analytical method is proposed to investigate the combined effect of high far-field hydraulic head and head generated by water-bearing faults on mountain tunnel structures. First, the virtual image technique and conformal mapping theory are employed to evaluate the water discharge and the head variation at concerned locations of deep circular tunnel embedded in water-rich zone, such as the lining, grouting ring and surrounding rocks. Second, the head difference is introduced as a new parameter to predict the uneven distribution of hydraulic head on tunnel structures. Then this paper contrasts to the classical Harr analytical solution and implements numerical simulation on the fault geological conditions to examine the presented analytical method, receiving reasonable agreements. Furthermore, sensitivity analyses are preformed to investigate the performance of concerned parameters on the distribution of hydraulic head on tunnel structure adjacent to water-bearing fault, including the magnitude of head induced by water-bearing fault, spacing between fault and tunnel, water discharge after drainage ditch installed and fault dip. The interesting point and ingenious approach are tracing the corresponding analytic functions for not only the influence of vertical fault adjacent to the tunnel but also the fault with an inclined angle, which enhances the engineering applicability of presented method. In general, this work contributes to the preliminary design of tunnels in water-rich fault zones and provides a theoretical basis on the tunnel excavation and operation in the mountainous area and other adverse geological environments with faults. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Production and outmigration of young‐of‐year (YOY) northern pike from natal sites in Lower Green Bay, WI, USA, were documented over three consecutive years (2013–2015). We tested the hypothesis that spawning success and outmigration characteristics of YOY northern pike would vary among natural and anthropogenically modified habitats. Sixteen focal study locations were surveyed, including a restored natural wetland, agricultural drainage ditches, a flooded forested wetland and several unimpounded tributaries. We collected 1469 YOY northern pike with most individuals (N = 1163) originating from a flooded forested wetland on the east shore. Most sites produced YOY in all years (range N = 2–1145 individuals among study years). Outmigration ranged between 1 and 40 days during 2013–2015. Greater production and extended outmigration times occurred at most sites in 2014 (range 17–40 days) when the region experienced a late spring with heavy precipitation. In contrast, the lowest production and shortest outmigration period occurred at most sites in 2015 (range 14–23 days) when environmental conditions reflected regional averages. Outmigration began nearly 3 weeks earlier in 2015 (5/8) than in other study years (8 June 2013 and 25 May 2014). Total length (TL) of outmigrating northern pike ranged between 17 and 138 mm. Total length of YOY was significantly different among sites in 2013 and 2014, with the smallest fish (17 mm TL) outmigrating from agricultural ditches in both years. There were no significant variations in size among sites in 2015 (range 21–95 mm TL). Our results indicate significant variation in YOY northern pike outmigration characteristics within Lower Green Bay that may reflect the interplay between adult spawning site selection and annual weather patterns. Our findings highlight the importance of quantifying overlooked habitats in regions of mixed development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, the frequency response of single gate organic thin film transistor (OTFT)‐based common source (CS) voltage amplifier is analyzed. Also, the contact‐channel resistance models are developed to validate the lower/upper cutoff frequency and mid‐band gain. The bandwidth of single gate bottom contact (BC) OTFT‐based amplifier is found to be 16 GHz, but the gain is quite low than the predicted due to its lower transconductance. Surprisingly, voltage gain is improved by four times (12.6 dB more) for dual gate TFT‐based amplifier. Moreover, the bandwidth (1 MHz) is also reasonably good. On applying top gate, biasing the gain is enhanced by 46%. Furthermore, two modified single gate BC structures, ditch and elevated source/drain (S/D) contacts, are incorporated to further augment the amplifier characteristics. Correspondingly, it shows a significant enhancement of 45% and 39% in the gain than that of normal BC. Additionally, the bandwidth is observed to be large and obtained as 100 and 96 MHz, which is also close to the expected analytically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Small water bodies including drainage ditches can be hotspots for methane (CH4) emissions from peatlands. We assessed the CH4 emissions of a drained and a rewetted temperate fen including emissions of managed and unmanaged drainage ditches over the course of 2.5 years, covering three vegetation periods. Ditch CH4 emissions in the rewetted fen were significantly higher than in the drained fen. In the rewetted fen ditches contributed up to 91% of the annual CH4 budget, despite covering only 1.5% of the area. In the drained fen CH4 emissions were solely made up of ditch emissions. When including CH4 uptake by the peat soil, the CH4 balance of the drained fen was neutral. Dissolved organic carbon concentrations likely had an enhancing effect on CH4 emissions while nitrate and sulfate in the ditch water seem to have had an inhibitory effect. Air and water temperature controlled seasonal variability of ebullitive as well as diffusive CH4 emissions. Ebullition contributed less than 10% to the overall CH4 budget in the ditches. Drainage ditches represent a hotspot of CH4 emissions and need therefore be taken into account when assessing the success of rewetting projects of peatlands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Surface water impoundment in an unlined triangular ditch during a single managed aquifer recharge (MAR) infiltration pulse lasts for time Te , after which all initially disposed water seeps into a homogenous isotropic coarse soil. In ditches with initial water W0 with depth H0 and length L , the dyad (W0,H0) vanishes at t→Te. The ditch slope that minimizes an objective function involving a linear combination of Te , W0 , and H0 with arbitrary cost coefficients was found. The analytical expression for Te as a function of the bank slope and the sand's porosity is for soils without capillarity and mild bank slopes. An isoperimetric constraint in optimization is the volume of the water pulse released into the ditch. A global unique minimum exists if the coefficients factoring W0 and H0 are not identically zero. A numerical solution to a two-dimensional infiltration problem was obtained using HYDRUS 2D/3D and its reservoir boundary condition option for arbitrary soils and bank slopes. Optimal slopes of triangular ditches were found for an initially dry loam. The analytical and numerical optimal shapes were not sensitive to mild variations of the ditch slope. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims: Vegetation sampling typically involves the use of quadrats to estimate species cover abundance. Such surveys do not generally record small‐scale vegetation patch structure at sub‐quadrat scales. Here we test a simple method to quantify patch structure that complements conventional techniques. We compare the two methods, and analyse metrics derived from small‐scale patch surveys with environment/management data. Location: Northumberland, United Kingdom. Methods: We recorded cover abundance of all species in an upland moor with 1‐m2 quadrats. These were divided into 100 'sub‐quadrats', 10 cm × 10 cm, and the dominant and subdominant species identified. Patch metrics (number, area and shape) for individual species recorded as dominant or subdominant in the subquadrat survey were analysed using multi‐variate generalised linear models with environmental and management data. Sub‐quadrat data were also aggregated for each quadrat, to create species composition data. The two sets of compositional data, from whole‐quadrat and sub‐quadrat aggregations, were compared via Procrustes rotation of ordination scores. Results: Patch number, area and shape for dominant and subdominant species were all significantly affected by soil pH, soil water content, slope and elevation. Effects of proximity to sheep tracks and drainage ditches were less consistent amongst species. Ordinations of vegetation data from conventional and sub‐quadrats were similar, with significant Procrustes R2 of 67% and 70% for dominant and subdominant species respectively. Conclusions: Sub‐quadrat surveys can easily be used to complement existing whole‐quadrat surveys at little cost in time or resources. Their patch metrics can provide additional insights into the environmental and management drivers that may affect the growth of individual plants or clumps, potentially in relation to plant traits, and thus alter the overall community composition. The methods we describe can readily be adapted to other sizes of quadrats and sub‐quadrats in a wide range of vegetation communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Long-tailed weasels (Mustela frenata) have an extensive North American geographic range and tolerate a wide range of life zones, excluding some desert ecosystems. However, little is known of their habitat use in landscapes fragmented by agriculture, despite the fact that long-tailed weasel populations may be declining in these landscapes. During late winter-spring and late summer-autumn 1998–2000, we monitored 11 long-tailed weasels (seven males, four females) via radio telemetry to examine patterns of habitat use in an Indiana landscape fragmented by agriculture. Long-tailed weasels exhibited scale-dependent patterns of habitat selection (i.e., habitat selection within a landscape and selection of habitats within home ranges). Weasels selected forest patches, fencerows, and drainage ditches, whereas agricultural fields were avoided. Forest patches and fencerows provided suitable den sites and refuge cover from other predators and exhibited an abundant and diverse prey community. Drainage ditches provided movement corridors and access to free-standing, drinking water. The resource selection patterns and limited dispersal ability of long-tailed weasels compared to other carnivores are consistent with the notion that long-tailed weasels appear sensitive to agriculturally induced fragmentation of habitat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1920, The Owens Bottle Company stated that the Whitney Glass Works of Glassboro was "the oldest glass establishment in the United States still doing business."1 In 1981 and 1982, the author collected artifacts from a deposit of waste attributed to the Whitney Glass Works, circa 1900. The waste was exposed during recutting of a drainage ditch along a railroad that had served the glassworks. The waste might have been used as fill, or the railroad might have been a convenient location for disposal. The collection includes defective mouth-blown bottles for products such as the famous Tabasco® sauce, vials, solid-glass bottles, stoppers, and lengths of a glass walking stick or punch-bowl stirring rod. Although the deposit contained cullet (glass residuum usually segregated for recycling), the presence of foreign objects (tools, wire mesh, and gloves) rendered the material a waste. These artifacts represent some of the last of the Whitney glassblowers' production, shortly before the installation of bottle-blowing machines. The artifacts yield information regarding manufacturing processes, date of manufacture, customer identities and products, the geographic breadth of Whitney's market, and the glassblowers' artistry. The collection was donated to Rowan University in 2012.2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agricultural drainage ditches help remove excess water from fields and provide habitat for wildlife. Drainage ditch management, which includes various forms of vegetation clearing and sediment dredging, can variably affect the ecological function of these systems. To determine whether ditch conditions following dredging/vegetation clearing management affected the survival, growth, and development of embryos and tadpoles of northern leopard frogs (Lithobates pipiens), we conducted three field studies using in situ cages over 2 years. We measured nutrients, pesticides, and other water quality properties in vegetated/unmanaged (i.e., no clearing or dredging) and newly cleared/dredged (i.e., treeless, then dredged), clay-bottomed drainage ditches in a river basin in Eastern Ontario, Canada. Nutrients, atrazine, and total neonicotinoid concentrations were generally lower at the cleared/dredged sites, whereas glyphosate was at higher concentrations. In contrast, water-quality variables measured in situ, particularly temperature, dissolved oxygen, and turbidity, tended to be higher in the cleared/dredged sites. Total phosphorous and total organic carbon concentrations at all sites were above the recommended limits for amphibian assays. No significant differences were detected in the survival, hatching success, or development of embryos among the ditch management treatments, but premature hatching was observed at one vegetated/unmanaged site where high specific conductivity may have been formative. We found the cleared/dredged sites supported earlier tadpole growth and development, likely as a result of the higher water temperatures. Increased temperature may have offset other growth/development stressors, such as those related to water chemistry. However, the long-term consequences of these differences on amphibian populations requires further study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Water Use Efficiency (WUE) can serve as an integrated functional indicator to guide the modernization construction of irrigation districts. Therefore, an accurate WUE classification can make a great contribution to the targeted improvement measures, particularly to the main controlling factors. Set Pair Analysis theory (SPA) and Variable Fuzzy Set theory (VFS) are widely used in water resources carrying capacity assessment, water quality assessment and environmental assessment. However, the classification and evaluation of water use efficiency in large-scale irrigation districts have the characteristics of many influencing factors and dynamic change of evaluation index classification standards. Both Set Pair Analysis theory and Variable Fuzzy Set theory have certain shortcomings in their applications. The SPA-VFS coupling model can realize the complementary advantages of variable fuzzy theory and set pair analysis, and make up for the shortcomings of the above two evaluations. Taking the Hetao Irrigation District as the research area, a WUE evaluation index system was constructed here from the aspects of water use level, engineering condition, agronomic measures, management level, planting structure, and ecological environment. The water efficiency of the irrigation system was divided into five grades: high, higher, medium, lower, and low, according to the current planning, standards, and the development status in large-scale irrigation areas in China. The graded standard of each index was determined according to the evaluation grade. An improved entropy method was used to assess the weight of each index. A SPA-VFS coupling model was selected for the WUE classification evaluation in the study area. Results showed that the WUE level was in the study Ⅲ area using the SPA-VFS coupling model, in good consistent with the VFS and SPA model. The SPA-VFS coupling model was verified to be feasible for the grade in the irrigation area. The stability range of the level eigenvalue was 3.12-3.17 in the SPA-VFS coupling model, whereas, that was 3.00-3.33 in the VFS model under different parameter combinations, indicating a significantly lower stability range of the level eigenvalue in the SPA-VFS coupling model than that in the VFS model. It inferred that the SPA-VFS coupling model was more suitable for accurate grade evaluation of large-scale irrigation areas. Consequently, a strong recommendation was made to subsequently strengthen the daily management of the supporting projects in the canal system and the drainage ditch in the Hetao Irrigation District. It was also highly demanding to timely repair, transform, and update the supporting projects beyond the normal operation. An autumn irrigation system was necessary to deepen the reform, in order to reduce appropriately the autumn irrigation water quota, and then the water consumption for irrigation per unit area. Many efforts, whether engineering, chemical, or biological measures, can be made to enhance the soil quality of saline-alkali land according to the degree of saline-alkali, and to reduce the share of salinization regions for a better ecological environment of irrigated areas. An emphasis should be laid on the lining of field channels, the promotion of efficient water-saving, the transformation of field water saving, and the information construction of irrigation areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Marshlands and floodplains are generally characterized by a long history of human occupation and management, with strong impacts on biodiversity. In these landscapes, ditch networks often represent the last or most significant aquatic habitat, and significantly contribute to regional biodiversity. To determine the drivers of biodiversity in ditch networks, especially the importance of the water regime, we monitored vegetation in ditches in 11 sites (independent blocks of ditch networks) of an Atlantic marshland (the Marais poitevin, France) over a 4-year period, and a panel of local environmental conditions and landscape characteristics. Large differences in the species richness and composition of ditch plant communities were observed among sites. The water regime had a predominant effect on all descriptors of ditch plant communities. High water levels combined with strong temporal variability, including drying-out periods, were found associated to the communities with the highest species richness. By contrast, water quality parameters did not influence plant communities across sites. Among landscape variables, woodland cover combined with high hedge cover along the ditches significantly influenced plant composition and species richness. These results are discussed in terms of management actions that may promote the diversity and composition of ditch plant communities and address conservation challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Field drainage causes habitat loss, alters natural flow regimes, and impairs water quality. Still, drainage ditches often are last remnants of aquatic and wetland habitats in agricultural landscapes and as such, can be important for local biodiversity. Two-stage channels are considered as a greener choice for conventional ditches, as they are constructed to mimic the structure of natural lowland streams providing a channel for drainage water and mechanisms to decrease diffuse loading. Two-stage channels could also benefit local biodiversity and ecosystem functions, but existing information on their ecological benefits is scarce and incomplete. We collected environmental and biological data from six agricultural stream systems in Finland each with consequent sections of a conventional ditch and a two-stage channel to study the potential of two-stage channels to enhance aquatic and riparian biodiversity and ecological functions. Biological data included samples of stream invertebrates, diatoms and plants and riparian beetles and plants. Overall, both section types were highly dominated by few core taxa for most of the studied organism groups. Riparian plant and invertebrate communities seemed to benefit from the two-stage channel structure with adjacent floodplains and drier ditch banks. In addition, two-stage channel sections had higher aquatic plant diversity, algal productivity, and decomposition rate, but lower stream invertebrate and diatom diversity. Two-stage channel construction did not diversify the structure of stream channels which is likely one explanation for the lack of positive effects on benthic diversity. However, both section types harbored unique taxa found only in one of the two types in all studied organism groups resulting in higher local gamma diversity. Thus, two-stage channels enhanced local biodiversity in agricultural landscapes. Improvements especially in aquatic biodiversity might be achieved by increasing the heterogeneity of in-stream habitat structure and with further efforts to decrease nutrient and sediment loads. • Two-stage channels (TSC) are greener option for conventional drainage ditches (CD). • Adjacent floodplains and ditch banks in TSC enhanced riparian plant and beetle diversity. • TSC construction did not seem to increase in-stream habitat heterogeneity. • TSC structure did not have positive effect on benthic communities. • Both TSC and CD had a number of unique taxa resulting in higher gamma diversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding an irrigation ditch plays an important role in intelligent agriculture environmental monitoring, especially in field environments where large chunks of ditches are particularly covered by various types of natural unstructured soil, vegetation and weeds. However, due to the diverse and unstructured muddy ditches, understanding them remains a challenge. Traditional approaches of understanding a scene from three-dimensional (3D) point clouds or multi-sensor fusion are energy intensive and computationally complex, making them quite laborious in application on a resource-constrained system. In this study, we propose a methodology to understand irrigation ditches and reconstruct them in a 3D scene, using only a resource-constrained monocular camera, without prior training. Spatial similar textures projections are extracted and clustered. Through geometric constraints of distribution and orientation, similar texture projections are refined and their corresponding surfaces are shaped. By contours and evidence lines, the ditch bottom surfaces are represented. Thus an irrigation ditch can be understood and reconstructed in a 3D environment, which can be used in agricultural automatic control system, agricultural robots, and precise agriculture. Unlike machine learning-based algorithms, the proposed method requires no prior training nor knowledge of the camera's internal parameters such as focal length, field angle, and aperture. Additionally, pure geometric features make the presented method robust to varying illumination and colour. The percentage of incorrectly classified pixels was compared to the ground truth. Experimental results demonstrated that the approach can successfully elucidate irrigation ditches, meeting requirements in safety monitoring in an agriculture environment. • Muddy irrigation ditches are understood using a low-cost monocular camera. • Monocular 3D reconstruction for irrigation ditches is developed. • The model requires no prior training or knowledge of the camera's parameters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Drainage ditches were critical sources of N 2 O emissions in salt-affected farmlands. • Precipitation events decreased the dissolved N 2 O concentrations and indirect N 2 O emissions. • High available carbon relative to nitrogen reduced N 2 O emissions at low DOC:DIN ratio levels by inhibiting nitrification. • DOC:DIN ratio regulated the spatiotemporal variations in EF 5. • The DOC:DIN ratio could enhance the predictions of EF 5 for drainage ditches in salt-affected farmlands. Agriculture is a main source of nitrous oxide (N 2 O) emissions. In agricultural systems, direct N 2 O emissions from nitrogen (N) addition to soils have been widely investigated, whereas indirect emissions from aquatic ecosystems such as ditches are poorly known, with insufficient data available to refine the IPCC emission factor. In this contribution, in situ N 2 O emissions from two ditch water‒air interfaces based on a diffusion model were investigated (almost once per month) from June 2021 to December 2022 in an intensive arable catchment with high N inputs and salt-affected conditions in the Qingtongxia Irrigation District, northwestern China. Our results implied that agricultural ditches (mean 148 μg N m−2 h−1) were significant sources for N 2 O emissions, and were approximately 2.1 times greater than those of the Yellow River directly connected to ditches. Agronomic management strategies increased N 2 O fluxes in summer, while precipitation events decreased N 2 O fluxes. Agronomic management strategies, including fertilization (294–-540 kg N hm−2) and irrigation on farmland, resulted in enhanced diffuse N loads in drain water, whereas precipitation diluted the dissolved N 2 O concentration in ditches and accelerated the ditch flow rate, leading to changes in the residence time of N-containing substances in water. The spatial analysis showed that N 2 O fluxes (202–233 μg N m−2 h−1) in the headstream and upstream regions of ditches due to livestock and aquaculture pollution sources were relatively high compared to those in the midstream and downstream regions (100–114 μg N m−2 h−1). Furthermore, high available carbon (C) relative to N reduced N 2 O fluxes at low DOC:DIN ratio levels by inhibiting nitrification. Spatiotemporal variations in the N 2 O emission factor (EF 5) across ditches with higher N resulted in lower EF 5 and a large coefficient of variation (CV) range. EF 5 was 0.0011 for the ditches in this region, while the EF 5 (0.0025) currently adopted by the IPCC is relatively high. The EF 5 variation was strongly controlled by the DOC:DIN ratio, TN, and NO 3 −-N, while salinity was also a nonnegligible factor regulating the EF 5 variation. The regression model incorporating NO 3 −-N and the DOC:DIN ratio could greatly enhance the predictions of EF 5 for agricultural ditches. Our study filled a key knowledge gap regarding EF 5 from agricultural ditches in salt-affected farmland and offered a field investigation for refining the EF 5 currently used by the IPCC. [Display omitted] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The entire process of crystallisation disease formation was successfully proposed. • The effect of coatings on preventing crystallisation blockage disease was successfully explored using a model experiment. • The anti-crystallisation mechanisms of hydrophobic coating have been proposed by field investigation and indoor research. Crystallisation blockage in the tunnel drainage system will reduce the drainage capacity, thereby increasing the risk of lining leakage and cracks, and even endangering the safety of the tunnel structure. To avoid the serious impact of this disease, this study aims to reveal its formation mechanism and explore the effects and suitability of coating on preventing crystallisation. Therefore, we investigated and quantified the crystallisation blockage within the drainage system of the Nanla tunnel. On this basis, an indoor model test was built to study the anti-crystallisation effect and mechanism of coating. The results indicated that the crystallisation blockage primarily consisted of calcium carbonate mixed with small amounts of sediment and cement hydrates. It is mainly because of the corrosion effect of groundwater on shotcrete. Regarding the inner coating of the drainage ditch, it demonstrated a certain anti-crystallisation effect, with the hydrophobic coating exhibiting the best performance. Moreover, the microscopic results showed that the coating can achieve anti-crystallisation by lubricating the substrate surface and forming an unstable calcium carbonate form. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Novel mapping methods using AI have led to improved mapping of the extent of drainage systems, but the full scope of the effects of drainage on ecosystems has yet to be understood. By combining ditches mapped with remote sensing and AI methods with soil data from the Swedish Forest Soil Inventory, and vegetation data from the National Forest Inventory we identified 4 126 survey plots within 100 m of a ditch. The inventory data span across three biomes; the northern boreal zone, the hemiboreal zone, and the temperate zone. We explored if soils and vegetation close to ditches were indeed different from the surrounding landscape. The large number of plots spread widely across the Swedish forest landscape spanning different physiographic regions, climates, topography, soils, and vegetation made it possible to identify the general effect of drainage on soil properties, tree productivity, and plant species composition. We found a surprisingly large amount of ditches on mineral soils (50–70%, depending on the definition of peatlands). Forest growth was affected, with higher growth rates of trees closer to ditches, particularly Norway spruce. Sphagnum mosses – a key indicator of wet soils - were less common near ditches, where they were replaced by feather mosses. The soil bulk density was higher closer to ditches, as was the concentration of metals that are typically associated with organic matter (Al), while concentrations of metals with a lower affinity for organic material decreased toward ditches (Na, K, Mg). The results from mineral soils and peat soils often differed. For example, N and tree volume increased toward ditches, but on different levels for peat and mineral soils, while the thickness of the humus layer and Pleurozium schreberi cover showed opposite patterns for the different soils. Clearly, ditches have affected the entire Swedish forest landscape, driving it towards a drier, more spruce-dominated productive forested ecosystem and away from wetland ecosystems like mires and littoral areas along streams. Furthermore, the biogeochemistry of the soils and understory species cover near ditches have changed, potentially irreversibly, at least within human time frames, and have implications for restoration goals and the future of forestry. • 50-70% of the drainage systems were found on mineral soils. • Ditches have changed the soil biogeochemistry. • Ditches have increased the tree volume and growth. • Ditches have changed understory species coverage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]