Preprints
https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-445
https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-445
05 Sep 2025
 | 05 Sep 2025
Status: this preprint is currently under review for the journal ESSD.

Development of historical maps of land use-land cover, crop type, nutrients, and irrigation across CONUS (1938–2020) at different spatial resolutions

Eric G. Booth and Christopher J. Kucharik

Abstract. Land use-land cover, nutrient inputs from fertilizer and manure, and irrigation are primary anthropogenic drivers of ecosystem functioning and degradation. Historical datasets covering these drivers at various spatial resolutions are essential for analyzing changes in these drivers as well as for input to models that estimate ecosystem outcomes such as water quality and runoff. We describe a new dataset for the conterminous United States (CONUS) – the Harmonized Land Nutrient Irrigation Dataset (HLNID) – that leverages existing datasets both at the county-scale (e.g., Census of Agriculture) and higher resolution land change model outputs (e.g., FORE-SCE) and remotely-sensed products (e.g., NLCD, CDL) to produce annual land use-land cover (including crop type), fertilizer and manure nutrient mass (nitrogen and phosphorus), and irrigation extent for the years 1938–2020. The flexible method can provide data at a range of custom spatial resolutions but we present results at 48 and 250 arc-seconds. The dataset reveals specific changes such as the increase in corn and soybean (replacing small grains and pasture) in the northern Great Plains since the 1990s, the spatial concentration of manure production in certain regions such as the uplands of the Southern Seaboard, and the expansion of irrigation in regions such as the Prairie Gateway. The method can readily incorporate new raw input datasets (e.g., CDL) to create updated versions but is limited by current time lags in state fertilizer sales data reporting.

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Eric G. Booth and Christopher J. Kucharik

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Eric G. Booth and Christopher J. Kucharik

Data sets

Harmonized land nutrient irrigation dataset (HLNID) for conterminous United States, 1938-2020 Eric G. Booth and Christopher J. Kucharik http://datadryad.org/share/0OQ59-ZZKmzDgcWs-qySOeckvainNTyILzyeuZIZH6w

Eric G. Booth and Christopher J. Kucharik
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Short summary
Land use-land cover, agricultural nutrients, and irrigation impact the benefits that humans receive from landscapes (e.g., water quality, food production). We present here the methods for developing historical (1938–2020) maps of all three of these critical drivers, which can be used to analyze the immense changes as agriculture has intensified with more nutrient inputs and irrigation and less crop diversity. The data can also be used to drive models including those that estimate water quality.
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