Land Use, Land Cover, and Climate Change in Southern Ontario: Implications for Nutrient Delivery to the Lower Great Lake
Southern Ontario is home to over a third of the Canadian population and is also one of the most productive agricultural areas in the country. This mosaic of a large and growing urban population and prime agricultural land creates particular challenges for
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Contents 1 Population of Southern Ontario 2 Urban Land Cover in Southern Ontario 2.1 Effects of Urban Land Use on Water Resources 2.2 Urban Contributions to Nutrient Losses 3 Agricultural Land Cover in Southern Ontario 3.1 Changes in Southern Ontario Agriculture 3.2 Changes in Agricultural Practices: Impacts on Water Quantity and Quality 3.3 The Interaction Between Water Resources, Land Use, and Climate Change 4 Where Do We Go From Here? References
Abstract Southern Ontario is home to over a third of the Canadian population and is also one of the most productive agricultural areas in the country. This mosaic of a large and growing urban population and prime agricultural land creates particular challenges for soil and water resource management. While urban areas continue to expand in southern Ontario, changes in agricultural cover and practices within the headwaters are also important to consider. There have been dramatic increases in tile-drained cash crop production (principally grain, corn, and soybean) in southern Ontario over the past few decades, largely at the expense of pasture and forage land. Urban populations will continue to expand into the future, but there is considerable scope for further agricultural change in the headwaters as well. Expansions in urban land cover and intensification of agriculture affect the hydrologic response to extreme events as well as water quality and nitrate leaching in particular. It is important to consider the effects of shifts in both types of land cover on stream
M. C. Eimers (*), F. Liu, and J. Bontje Trent School of the Environment, Trent University, Peterborough, ON, Canada e-mail: [email protected] Jill Crossman and Chris Weisener (eds.), Contaminants of the Great Lakes, Hdb Env Chem, DOI 10.1007/698_2020_519, © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
M. C. Eimers et al.
flow and water quality in the variable landscape and climatic conditions of the lower Great Lakes. Keywords Agriculture, Land use change, Nutrients, Water quality
1 Population of Southern Ontario Ontario is Canada’s second largest and most populous province (13.4 million), accounting for 38% of the nation’s population in 2016 [1]. Over 90% of the Ontario population lives within the approximately 84,000 km2 area known as southern Ontario, shown in Fig. 1, concentrated within several larger urban centers that are located primarily along the northern shoreline of Lake Ontario. The Toronto census metropolitan area (CMA) alone accounts for almost half of the Ontario population (5.9 million) and 1 in 5 of all Canadians resides within the Toronto CMA (Fig. 1). Southern Ontario is also one of the fastest expanding areas in the country, with an overall population increase of 6.2% between 2011 and 2016 compared with a national growth rate of 5% [1]. The majority of future population growth in Ontario is expected to occur within southern Ontario, and if current rates of growth continue, the population is expected to grow by 30%, or almost 5 million, to approximately 18.5 million in 2040 [2].
2 Urban Land Cover
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