Effect of Landscape Use on Water Quality of the Žitava River

Abstract

Intensification of landscape use brings along the negative effects on environmental components. These include surface water pollution. The aim was to determine the effect of landscape use on the water quality of the Žitava river. It was assumed that an area with the high proportion of anthropogenic activity would negatively affect water quality. At the same time, we assumed that an area with the lower proportion of anthropogenic use and with the higher proportion of natural and semi-natural elements contributes to self-cleaning ability of the watercourse. At the four observed sites, ammoniacal nitrogen (NH4-N), nitrate-nitrogen (NO3-N), phosphate-phosphorus (PO4-P) and water conductivity were monitored. Landscape use was analysed using the database of land cover based on the CORINE Land Cover methodology. Subsequently, it was observed how the landscape use affects the water quality. It was found that the very good state, represented by the Class I water quality, is according to the measured indicators mostly present in the areas predominantly covered by forests along with extensive use of elements of the agricultural land. The area with predominance of agricultural and urbanised sites where the anthropogenic influence prevails is characterised by average water quality. As the overall water quality of the Žitava river reaches the average, it is necessary to eliminate the pollution by constructing the sewer systems in the villages through which the watercourse is passing and, in agriculture, to ensure the adherence to the legislation concerning the protection of surface water against pollution from agricultural sources.

Assessing the Water Quality of Akwa Ibom State North-West District, Nigeria, using Water Quality Indices and Palmer Pollution Index

“…Solanki (2012) reported that agricultural field runoffs are one of the major causes of nitrate input into the water body. Petlušová et al (2019) in a similar study pointed out that pollution of water is caused by the current and dominant anthropogenic activities in the area. Chapman (1996) reported that nitrate values above 5 mgL −1 is an indication of pollution resulting from organic sources.…”

Spatial and temporal variations of physical-chemical parameters of the Akor River in Ikwuano local government of Abia state, Nigeria

“…Higher values of TDS recorded for the Akor River between April and June 2019 could probably be due to active various farming activities such as clearing, ploughing and ridge making in the farmlands around the river (Petlušová et al, 2019). Additionally, heavy runoffs as a result of early rainfall during these months may also have contributed immensely to these higher values.…”

Water Quality from the Sources of Non-Centralized Water Supply within the Rural Settlements of Zhytomyr Region

“…In particular, water quality from the sources of non-centralized water supply has been studied in the US by Zheng, Flanagan (2017) and Schaider et al (2019) (in particular, the report by DeSimone et al, 2009 indicated that more than one in five [23%] domestic wells contained one or more contaminants at a concentration greater than a human health benchmark), in the shallow wells of Keiyo Highlands (Kenya) by Mbaka et al (2017), in Ireland by Hooks et al (2019), in Tai'an City (China) by Wu-yuan (2010), in Pakistan by Daud et al (2017), in eastern Slovakia by Sasakova et al (2018), and in Limpopo Province (South Africa) by Edokpayi et al (2018). A number of researchers have studied the factors that have impact on water quality (Khatri, Tyagi, 2014) and assessed it by the content of specific pollutants such as nitrates (Schaider et al, 2019;Petlušová et al, 2019), arsenic (Shiber, 2005;Zheng, Flanagan, 2017), and heavy metals (Edokpayi et al, 2018). Gibson and Kelsey Water Quality Improvement Strategy (2017) and the implementation of individual components (Malecki et al, 2017;Eggers et al, 2018) are also worth noting.…”