Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
---|---|---|---|---|
11024792 | Geoderma | 2019 | 10 Pages |
Abstract
Vegetation cover can effectively prevent soil erosion and plays an important role in soil and water conservation. Accurate estimation of the sediment transport capacity (Tc) is critical for soil erosion models. Tc data for different levels of vegetation cover, however, are quite limited. The objectives of this study were to evaluate the influence of stem basal cover, slope gradient and discharge on the transport capacity of overland flows for Tc prediction. A non-erodible flume (5â¯m long and 0.37â¯m wide) was used in this study. The discharge ranged from 0.5â¯Ãâ¯10â3 to 2â¯Ãâ¯10â3â¯m3â¯sâ1, the slope gradient was from 8.8% to 25.9% and an artificial stem basal cover of 0, 1.25%, 2.5%, 5%, 10%, 15%, 20%, 25% and 30% was used to represent the natural vegetation. Stems 2â¯mm in diameter were randomly arranged. The sediment size for the experiment ranged from 0.25 to 0.59â¯mm with a median diameter of 0.35â¯mm. The results show that the measured Tc decreased exponentially as the stem basal cover increased, and the rate of decrease was far greater than what has been reported in the literature. The transport capacity was affected more by the stem basal cover than by slope and discharge when the cover exceeded approximately 2-3%. The research shows that the surface or stem basal cover plays a critical role in reducing the transport capacity of overland flows.
Related Topics
Physical Sciences and Engineering
Earth and Planetary Sciences
Earth-Surface Processes
Authors
Hongli Mu, Xianju Yu, Suhua Fu, Bofu Yu, Yingna Liu, Guanghui Zhang,