Details zur Publikation

Kategorie Textpublikation
Referenztyp Zeitschriften
DOI 10.5194/hess-25-6523-2021
Lizenz creative commons licence
Titel (primär) Machine learning methods to assess the effects of a non-linear damage spectrum taking into account soil moisture on winter wheat yields in Germany
Autor Peichl, M.; Thober, S.; Samaniego, L. ORCID logo ; Hansjürgens, B.; Marx, A.
Quelle Hydrology and Earth System Sciences
Erscheinungsjahr 2021
Department OEKON; CHS
Band/Volume 25
Heft 12
Seite von 6523
Seite bis 6545
Sprache englisch
Topic T5 Future Landscapes
Abstract Agricultural production is highly dependent on the weather. The mechanisms of action are complex and interwoven, making it difficult to identify relevant management and adaptation options. The present study uses random forests to investigate such highly non-linear systems for predicting yield anomalies in winter wheat at district level in Germany. In order to take into account sub-seasonality, monthly features are used that explicitly take soil moisture into account in addition to extreme meteorological events. Clustering is used to show spatially different damage potentials, such as a higher susceptibility to drought damage from April to July in eastern Germany compared to the rest of the country. The variable that explains most differences is soil moisture in March, where higher soil moisture has a detrimental effect on crop yields. In general, soil moisture explains more yield variations than the meteorological variables, while the top 25 cm of soil moisture is a better yield predictor than the total soil column. The approach has proven to be suitable to explain historical extreme yield anomalies for years with exceptionally high losses (2003, 2018) and gains (2014) and the spatial distribution of these anomalies. The highest test R-square is about 0.70. Furthermore, the sensitivity of yield variations to soil moisture and extreme meteorological conditions, as shown by the visualisation of average marginal effects, contributes to the promotion of targeted decision support systems.
dauerhafte UFZ-Verlinkung https://www.ufz.de/index.php?en=20939&ufzPublicationIdentifier=23930
Peichl, M., Thober, S., Samaniego, L., Hansjürgens, B., Marx, A. (2021):
Machine learning methods to assess the effects of a non-linear damage spectrum taking into account soil moisture on winter wheat yields in Germany
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. 25 (12), 6523 - 6545 10.5194/hess-25-6523-2021