Exercises for Use with the People in Watersheds/System Integration (PEWI) Land-Use Learning Game and Tool

Carrie Chennault, Lisa Schulte Moore and John Tyndall
Iowa State University Department of Natural Resource Ecology and Management

Updated August 2018

Exercise 1: Ecological Functions

Objective: Understand how watershed ecosystem service indicators are linked to land use and management.

Activity: For year one, design a scenario with all conventional corn and soybeans. Review the scores, maps, and results. For year two, now turn everything to perennial vegetation. Carefully examine the differences. Write a brief (2-3 sentences) description of each scenario in terms of the quantity and arrangement of land uses. Answer the following questions.

Questions:

Which scenario has the highest potential to produce the following ecosystem goods: crops, timber, cattle (Hint: click on the upper right buttons to view ecosystem service indicators)?
Which scenario has the highest potential to produce the following ecosystem services: habitat for biodiversity, carbon storage, and water quality? What is carbon storage? How are you evaluating water quality impacts using the model?
Which land uses are perennial types? How does the presence of perennial vegetation in the watershed relate to the delivery of services?

Exercise 2: Ecological Functions and Conservation Practices

Objective: Understand how conservation practices, including in-field and edge-of- field (i.e., riparian buffers) practices, impact watershed outputs.

Terms:

In-field conservation practices include: contouring, cover crops, no-till, prairie strips, terracing
Edge-of field conservation practices include: grassed waterways, riparian buffers

Activity:

Start at year one with an all conventional corn and soybean scenario. For year two, go back and use conservation corn and soybean instead. Start changing land uses along the stream to perennial land uses and locations with poor drainage to wetlands. Answer the following questions.

Questions:

What are “conventional” practices and “conservation” agricultural practices?
What is an in-field conservation practice and what are they designed to do? How do they impact gross erosion and phosphorous in-stream loading? How about sediment in-stream delivery levels? How about nitrate in-stream concentration? Explain differences in the response of these indicators.
What does it mean for a stream to be “buffered” versus “unbuffered”? Which indicators respond to buffering? Do their responses make sense; why or why not?
Why are the strategic wetland locations optimal places to impact watershed outputs? (Hint: Find strategic wetland locations by clicking the “Physical Features” tab on the left.)

Exercise 3: Spatial Targeting

Objective: Understand how some locations in watersheds have greater positive or negative impact on watershed ecosystem service indicators than others, due to their environmental configuration.

Activities:

Create three scenarios and, once you are satisfied, briefly describe them (3-5) sentences:
a) Agricultural production landscape
b) Scenario 1 altered to dramatically improve water quality, with minimal production loss (Hint: Use the information displayed in the “Physical Features” maps)
c) Scenario 2 altered to dramatically improve habitat for biodiversity, with minimal production loss.
Record ecosystem service results associated with this scenario for later referral (Hint: Click on “Results” to find exact numbers.)

Questions:

What are topographic relief, flood frequency, subwatershed boundaries, strategic wetland areas, and drainage class, and why are they important?
How does spatial placement of the perennial vegetation impact water quality? Biodiversity? Game wildlife? Crop productivity? Carbon sequestration?
Examine PEWI’s flowmap (http://www.nrem.iastate.edu/pewi/pewi-science-model-diagram). Which factors vary based on location in the watershed? In other words, what specifically needs to be considered when spatially targeting management practices to meet outcomes over watershed scales?
Conceptually, what is RUSLE and what are key variables related to it?
Examine the factors considered in the biodiversity and game wildlife indicators. Do you find any of the factors considered surprising; why or why not?

Exercise 4: Inter-annual Variability

Objective: Understand that differences in ecosystem service indicators are influenced by changes that occur over time.

Activity: Starting from year 1, create a scenario that depicts an agricultural production landscape with at least three crops. Then click on year 2 and year 3. Record the precipitation levels each year (Hint: at the bottom of the “Results” page). Click on “Score” and briefly (3-5 sentences) describe how the ecosystem service indicators vary from year to year. For years with lower scores, try to adjust your design to improve your score. Answer the questions below:

Questions:

What differences in the watershed occur over time?
How do the ecosystem service indicators (Hint: Click on “Score”) respond to those differences?
What strategies did you use to improve your score?
Which scores were you successful in improving, and which scores were you not successful in improving?
Do certain land uses perform better in wet or dry climate years compared to normal years, and what properties of those land uses explain these differences?
How would you expect a continuous land use to perform over time compared to rotating land uses?

Exercise 5: Tradeoffs

Objective: Understand that tradeoffs exist among land uses and their location in achieving multiple outputs from watersheds. Also understand how to enhance co-benefits (multiple ecosystem goods and services) from land uses and their locations.

Activity: Starting from scratch, select different land uses from the “Land Use” tab to design a watershed that maximizes all ecosystem service indicators, including both crop and livestock production (i.e., crops, wood, cattle) and environmental outcomes (i.e., climate adaptation and mitigation, habitat, soil quality, and water quality). Once you are satisfied, briefly (3-5 sentences) describe the characteristics of your scenario in terms of land use composition and placement, as well as key decisions you made in developing it. Record the ecosystem service indicator scores (hint: use
“Results” tab on the right to access specific numbers). Answer the questions below and be prepared to present your results to the entire group.

Questions:

List six challenges to achieving your design: two economic, two ecological, and two social.
What government cost-share programs could you access to help achieve your watershed design?
What organizations or institutions could help increase social, economic, and government support for your watershed design?
Where in the watershed would these programs be applicable?
What other trade-offs exist that are not presented in PEWI?