Evaluation of soil water storage efficiency for rainfall harvesting on hillslope micro-basins built using time domain reflectometry measurements

Previati, Maurizio; Provenzale, Antonello; Canone, Davide; Haverkamp, R.

doi:10.1016/j.agwat.2009.11.004

Cited by 30 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…2) and decreased SWS (Table 2) deficit during both rainstorms and drying periods compared to the treatment of fish-scale pits alone. On the one hand, during the dry periods between rainstorms, fish-scale pits increase soil evaporation because of the larger contact area of soil and air; during the rainstorms, the physical crust which is caused by runoff also reduces the treatment of fish-scale pitsthe infiltration (Previati et al, 2010). On the other hand, mulching could effectively reduce the formation of soil physical crust by filtering soil particles during rainstorms, improved soil water-stable aggregates, and increased soil-water-holding capacity (Lin and Chen, 2015).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Integrating a mini catchment with mulching for soil water management in a sloping jujube orchard on the semiarid Loess Plateau of China

Zhao

et al. 2016

Solid Earth

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Abstract. Conserving more soil water is of great importance to the sustainability of arid and semiarid orchards. Here we integrated fish-scale pits, semicircular mini-catchments for hill slope runoff collection, with mulches to test their effects on soil water storage in a 12-year-old dryland jujube orchard on the Loess Plateau of China, by using soil water measurements from April 2013 to November 2014. This experiment included four treatments: fish-scale pits with branch mulching (FB), fish-scale pits with straw mulching (FS), fish-scale pits without mulching (F), and bare land treatment (CK). Soil water was measured using the TRIME ® -IPH time-domain reflectometer (TDR) tool in 20 cm intervals down to a depth of 180 cm, and was measured once every 2 weeks in the 2013 and 2014 growing seasons. The results showed that fish-scale pits with mulching were better in soil water conservation. Average soil water storage (SWS, for short) of FB at soil layer depths of 0-180 cm increased by 14.23 % (2013) and 21.81 % (2014), respectively, compared to CK, but only increased by 4.82 % (2013) and 5.34 % (2014), respectively, for the F treatment. The degree of soil water compensation, W S , was employed here to represent to what extent soil water was recharged from precipitation at the end of the rainy season relative to that at the beginning of the rainy season. A positive (negative) W S larger (lower) soil water content at the end of rainy season than at the beginning. For the treatment of FB, the values of W S over the entire soil profile were greater than 0; for the treatment of F, negative values of W S were observed in depths of 60-100 cm in both years. However, the bare land treatment showed negative values in depths of 40-180 cm. This indicated that integrating fish-scale pits with mulching could significantly increase soil water storage by increasing infiltration and decreasing evaporation, and it showed greater soil water storage and degree of soil water compensation compared to fish-scale pits alone. Since the branches used for mulching here were trimmed jujube branches, the cost of mulching materials was largely reduced. Therefore, integration of fish-scale pits with branch mulching is recommended in orchards for soil water conservation on the Loess Plateau and potentially for other regions.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Integrating a mini catchment with mulching for soil water management in a sloping jujube orchard on the semiarid Loess Plateau of China

Zhao

et al. 2016

Solid Earth

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“…Landscape management, such as micro-topography reconstruction, can effectively increase rain-water infiltration (Previati et al, 2010;Rejani and Yadukumar, 2010). This is especially true in the semi-arid Loess Plateau.…”

Section: Effects Of Landscape Management On Soil Moisturementioning

confidence: 99%

Response of deep soil moisture to land use and afforestation in the semi-arid Loess Plateau, China

Yang

Wei

Chen

et al. 2012

Journal of Hydrology

209

126

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s u m m a r ySoil moisture is an effective water source for plant growth in the semi-arid Loess Plateau of China. Characterizing the response of deep soil moisture to land use and afforestation is important for the sustainability of vegetation restoration in this region. In this paper, the dynamics of soil moisture were quantified to evaluate the effect of land use on soil moisture at a depth of 2 m. Specifically, the gravimetric soil moisture content was measured in the soil layer between 0 and 8 m for five land use types in the Longtan catchment of the western Loess Plateau. The land use types included traditional farmland, native grassland, and lands converted from traditional farmland (pasture grassland, shrubland and forestland). Results indicate that the deep soil moisture content decreased more than 35% after land use conversion, and a soil moisture deficit appeared in all types of land with introduced vegetation. The introduced vegetation decreased the soil moisture content to levels lower than the reference value representing no human impact in the entire 0-8 m soil profile. No significant differences appeared between different land use types and introduced vegetation covers, especially in deeper soil layers, regardless of which plant species were introduced. High planting density was found to be the main reason for the severe deficit of soil moisture. Landscape management activities such as tillage activities, micro-topography reconstruction, and fallowed farmland affected soil moisture in both shallow and deep soil layers. Tillage and micro-topography reconstruction can be used as effective countermeasures to reduce the soil moisture deficit due to their ability to increase soil moisture content. For sustainable vegetation restoration in a vulnerable semi-arid region, the plant density should be optimized with local soil moisture conditions and appropriate landscape management practices.

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“…There are numerous applications for determining the spatial distribution of water content in soils [14] and snow [15], for water content determination in woody biomass [16] and wood materials [17,18] or for the purpose of irrigation scheduling [19]. TDR measurement equipment was also successfully implemented in particular study cases [20,21]. TDR soil moisture meters are commercially available, however their relatively high price limits the applications of this measurement technique mainly to scientific research in hydrology [19], optimization of soil irrigation techniques [22], or the soil surface layer moisture monitoring for the purpose of validation and calibration of satellite images used for assessing the influence of the soil moisture on the climate on global scale [23].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A TDR-Based Soil Moisture Monitoring System with Simultaneous Measurement of Soil Temperature and Electrical Conductivity

Skierucha

Wilczek

Szypłowska

et al. 2012

Sensors

110

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Elements of design and a field application of a TDR-based soil moisture and electrical conductivity monitoring system are described with detailed presentation of the time delay units with a resolution of 10 ps. Other issues discussed include the temperature correction of the applied time delay units, battery supply characteristics and the measurement results from one of the installed ground measurement stations in the Polesie National Park in Poland.

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Evaluation of soil water storage efficiency for rainfall harvesting on hillslope micro-basins built using time domain reflectometry measurements

Cited by 30 publications

References 16 publications

Integrating a mini catchment with mulching for soil water management in a sloping jujube orchard on the semiarid Loess Plateau of China

Integrating a mini catchment with mulching for soil water management in a sloping jujube orchard on the semiarid Loess Plateau of China

Response of deep soil moisture to land use and afforestation in the semi-arid Loess Plateau, China

A TDR-Based Soil Moisture Monitoring System with Simultaneous Measurement of Soil Temperature and Electrical Conductivity

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