Simulation of field-scale winter wheat nitrogen dynamics using a remote sensing supported land surface model

The land surface process model PROMET is used to simulate the nitrogen cycle of two large winter wheat fields (115 and 87 ha) in Northern Germany in dependence of the prevailing meteorology and the given fertilizations (site specific and homogeneous). Through assimilation of remote sensing information, small scale patterns of nitrogen concentration could be modelled, which correlate strongly (R² up to 0.82) with Yara N-Tester field measurements during the month of May 2013. With increasing homogeneity of the canopy, the correlation gradually decreases towards June 2013 (R² = 0.22). The achieved results are a strong indicator that the precise simulation of temporal and spatial nitrogen dynamics of winter wheat fields is possible with the proposed model system.