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Design of environmentally preferable agricultural drainage channels calls for an improved understanding of cohesive sediment processes. Flow and cohesive sediments were investigated in a new demonstration and test channel where a floodplain was excavated on one side of the existing channel to improve flood conveyance. In this approach, the existing, naturally recovered channel was mostly left intact to reduce environmental impacts. Continuous monitoring of discharge and suspended sediment concentration (SSC) during 1 year revealed that the construction work of the two-stage channel caused 2% of the annual suspended sediment (SS) load. Agricultural areas covering 13% of the catchment were estimated to contribute over half of the annual SS, predominantly during the rising stages. Seasonal positive hysteresis was found in SSC which was explained by different drainage efficiencies of two distinct sediment sources. The temporally varying shares of the two sources caused scatter in the rating curves between discharge and SSC or SS load. Out-of-channel processes were shown to govern the amount and timing of the SS input into the channel, indicating that environmentally preferable agricultural channel design should consider the cohesive sediment processes and sources at the catchment scale. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Conventional dredging of ditches and streams to ensure agricultural drainage and flood mitigation can have severe environmental impacts. The aim of this paper is to investigate the potential benefits of an alternative, nature-based two-stage channel (TSC) design with floodplains excavated along the main channel. Through a literature survey, investigations at Finnish field sites and expert interviews, we assessed the performance, costs, and monetary environmental benefits of TSCs in comparison to conventional dredging, as well as the bottlenecks in their financing and governance. We found evidence supporting the expected longer-term functioning of drainage as well as larger plant and fish biodiversity in TSCs compared to conventional dredging. The TSC design likely improves water quality since the floodplains retain suspended sediment and phosphorus and remove nitrogen. In the investigated case, the additional value of phosphorus retention and conservation of protected species through the TSC design was 2.4 times higher than the total costs. We demonstrate how TSCs can be made eligible for the obligatory vegetated riparian buffer of the European Union agri-environmental subsidy scheme (CAP-AES) by optimising their spatial application with respect to other buffer measures, and recommend to publicly finance their additional costs compared to conventional dredging at priority sites. Further studies on biodiversity impacts and long-term performance of two-stage channels are required. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]