Patch cropping- a new methodological approach to determine new field arrangements that increase the multifunctionality of agricultural landscapes.

• Patch Cropping is a novel approach for small-scale and site-specific cropping system design. • Fields are divided based on a step by step protocol into different yield potential zones. • Maximum working width, permanent traffic lane and simple geometries are considered. • Relative variance change due to number of growing seasons (GS), edge length and parallel shift. • Independent cross validation shows decrease of RMSEP with increasing number of GS. Agricultural intensification decreased land cover complexity by converting small complex arable field geometries into large and simple structures which then were managed uniformly. These changes have led to a variety of negative environmental effects and influence ecosystem services. We present a novel small-scale and site-specific cropping system which splits a large field into small homogeneous sub-fields called 'patches' grouped in different yield potentials. A detailed workflow is presented to generate new spatially arranged patches with special focus on preprocessing and filtering of multi-year yield data, the variation in patch sizes and the adaptation of maximum working width to use available conventional farm equipment and permanent traffic lanes. The reduction of variance by the used cluster algorithm depends on the within-field heterogeneity. The patch size, the number of growing seasons (GS) used for clustering and the parallel shift of the patch structure along the permanent traffic lane resulted in a change in relative variance. Independent cross validation showed an increased performance of the classification algorithm with increasing number of GS used for clustering. The applied cluster analysis resulted in robust field segregation according to different yield potential zones and provides an innovative method for a novel cropping system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]