Conservation identities of farmers in the Maumee River watershed, derived from farmer surveys, were embedded into a SWAT watershed model. This was done to improve the representation of the heterogeneity among farmers in the decision-making process related to the adoption of conservation practices. Modeled farm operations, created with near field-level Hydrologic Response Units (HRUs) within the SWAT model, were assigned a modeled primary operator. Modeled primary operators held unique conservation identities driven by their spatial location within the watershed. Five pathways of targeting the adoption of subsurface placement of phosphorus and buffer strips to HRUs within the watershed were assessed. Targeting pathways included targeting by HRU-level phosphorus losses, conservation identity of model operators, a hybrid approach combining HRU-level phosphorus losses and conservation identity of the model primary operator managing the HRU, and a proxy measure for random placement throughout the watershed. Targeting the placement of subsurface phosphorus application to all agricultural HRUs resulted in the greatest reduction in total phosphorus losses (32%) versus buffer strips (23%). For both conservation practices, targeting by HRU-level total phosphorus losses resulted in the most efficient rate of phosphorus reduction as measured by the ratio of phosphorus reduction to conservation practice adoption rates. The hybrid targeting approach closely resembled targeting by phosphorus losses, indicating near optimal results can be obtained even when constraining adoption by farmer characteristics. These results indicate that by developing management strategies based on a combination of field-level information and human-operator characteristics, a more efficient use of limited resources can be used while achieving near-maximal environmental benefits as compared to managing environmental outcomes solely based on field-level information.

来自农民调查的 Maumee 河流域农民的保护身份被嵌入到 SWAT 流域模型中。这样做是为了改善农民在与采用保护措施有关的决策过程中的异质性。在 SWAT 模型中使用近场级别的水文响应单位 (HRU) 创建的模拟农场操作被分配了一个模拟的主要操作员。建模的主要运营商拥有独特的保护身份，这是由他们在流域内的空间位置驱动的。评估了针对流域内 HRU 的采用磷和缓冲带的地下放置的五种途径。定位路径包括 HRU 级别的磷损失定位、模型运营商的保护身份、一种混合方法，结合 HRU 级别的磷损失和管理 HRU 的模型主要运营商的保护身份，以及在整个流域中随机放置的代理措施。将地下磷应用定位到所有农业 HRU 导致总磷损失 (32%) 与缓冲带 (23%) 相比减少幅度最大。对于这两种保护实践，以 HRU 级别的总磷损失为目标，通过磷减少量与保护实践采用率的比率来衡量，导致了最有效的磷减少率。混合定位方法与磷损失定位非常相似，表明即使限制农民特征的采用，也可以获得接近最佳的结果。