Premium
Rill development and soil erosion: a laboratory study of slope and rainfall intensity
Author(s) -
Berger Catherine,
Schulze Marcel,
RiekeZapp Dirk,
Schlunegger Fritz
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
earth surface processes and landforms
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.294
H-Index - 127
eISSN - 1096-9837
pISSN - 0197-9337
DOI - 10.1002/esp.1989
Subject(s) - rill , surface runoff , environmental science , hydrology (agriculture) , digital elevation model , cambisol , intensity (physics) , sediment , erosion , plateau (mathematics) , geology , soil science , soil water , geomorphology , mathematics , geotechnical engineering , remote sensing , ecology , physics , quantum mechanics , biology , mathematical analysis
A total of 15 rainfall simulation experiments were conducted in a 1 m by 2 m box varying slope (10, 20, 30%) and rainfall intensity (60, 90, 120 mm h −1 ). The experiments were performed to study how rill networks initiate and evolve over time under controlled conditions with regard to the treatment variables considered, and to allow for input in a computer simulation model. Runoff and sediment yield samples were collected. Digital elevation models were calculated by means of photogrammetry for several time steps of most experiments. The soil used in the experiments was a basal till derived Cambisol typical for the Swiss Plateau. While significant differences were found for sediment yield, runoff did not vary significantly with treatment combinations. Increasing rainfall intensity had a larger effect on sediment yield than increasing slope. Rill density and energy expenditure decreased with time, suggesting that energy expenditure was a useful parameter to describe the emergence of rill network at the laboratory scale. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.