Agricultural activities play a major role in the derivation of non-point source (NPS) pollutants for receiving waters. Non-point source pollutants include sediments, pesticides and nutrients derived from a diffuse source, and are especially important in receiving water systems in the mid-South that are interconnected with the Mississippi River watershed and ultimately coastal waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Best management practices (BMP's) such as no-till and drainage have been implemented by farmers and managers alike to reduce NPS loads. Drainage ditches have traditionally been viewed as conduits to rapidly move nutrient laden waters from the agricultural landscape. More recently, scientists are identifying a shift in function of surface drainage ditches as landscape features for NPS load reduction. This dissertation aimed to highlight the potential role agricultural drainage ditches under no-till cotton, played in mitigating nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) loads to receiving waters (see this dissertation Chapters 2, 3 and 4). It also looked directly at plant uptake and questioned the role senescence played in the temporal pattern of nutrient sequestration and release in drainage ditches (see this dissertation Chapter 5). For two years, two farm ditches were compared against two controls. Nutrient loads (see this dissertation Chapters 3 and 4) were evaluated independent of the controls to determine a mitigation capacity for the farm ditches. Stratified sampling locations within ditches were monitored monthly for baseflow, and on a per storm basis for rainfall generated stormflow and overland surface runoff. Nutrient enriched ditch vegetation was compared to non-enriched vegetation to determine the presence of luxury uptake and resultant nutrient loss during senescence in a greenhouse experiment. Differences between treatments (see this dissertation Chapters 2-5) were analyzed using student t-tests, ANOVA, post hoc Tukey significant tests and Pearson's correlations with an alpha of 0.05. Data were classed into growing (April-September) and dormant (October-March) seasons. Nitrogen and P concentrations were highest after both fertilization events in 2004 and 2005 and subsequently decreased in concentration throughout the rest of the year (see this dissertation Chapter 2). High nitrate-N concentrations were associated with baseflow and subsurface processes, while high total orthophosphate and particulate phosphorus concentrations were associated with surface processes of overland surface runoff and stormflows. Incorporating N and P concentrations with Manning's equation, and Natural Resources Conservation Service dimensionless unit hydrographs provided total water volumes per storm event, and maximum farm N and P loads (see this dissertation Chapters 3 and 4). Nitrogen baseflow and storm regression results indicated drainage ditches to be sinks for NO3 - and NH 3 over both growing and dormant seasons. Overall maximum storm loads of dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) from the farm over the two year sampling period accounted for 6.8% of initial fertilizer application, of which 3% actually left the ditches (0.84 kg/ha/yr): a 57% ditch retention of DIN load over 2 years (see this dissertation Chapter 3). Phosphorus baseflow regressions and percentage reductions with storm loads showed that ditches alternated between being a sink and a source for dissolved phosphorus and particulate phosphorus concentrations throughout the year. Storm event loads resulted in 31% of the annual applied fertilizer (9.1 kg/ha/yr) to be transported into drainage ditches. Ditches mitigated 47% of the total effluent P load, leaving 1.8 kg/ha/yr to enter receiving waters (see this dissertation Chapter 4). When exposed to elevated (>2 mg/L N and P) runoff the drainage ditch macrophyte, Leersia oryzoides assimilated significantly higher concentrations of N (p