Impacts of Weather Types on Soil Erosion Rates in Vineyards at “Celler Del Roure” Experimental Research in Eastern Spain

Abstract

To understand soil erosion processes, it is vital to know how the weather types and atmospheric situations, and their distribution throughout the year, affect the soil erosion rates. This will allow for the development of efficient land management practices to mitigate water-induced soil losses. Vineyards are one of the cultivated areas susceptible to high soil erosion rates. However, there is a lack of studies that link weather types and atmospheric conditions to soil erosion responses in viticultural areas. Thus, the main aim of this research is to assess the impacts of weather types and atmospheric conditions on soil erosion processes in a conventional vineyard with tillage in eastern Spain. To achieve this goal, rainfall events from 2006 to 2017 were monitored and the associated runoff and soil loss were collected from experimental plots. Our results showed that the highest volume of runoff and soil erosion is linked to rainfall associated with the eastern winds that accounted for 59.7% of runoff and 63.9% of soil loss, while cold drops in the atmospheric situation classifications emerged as the highest contributor of 40.9% in runoff and 44.1% in soil loss. This paper provides new insights into the development of soil erosion control measures that help to mitigate the negative impact of extreme rainfall and runoff considering atmospheric conditions.

Features of weather types involving heavy rainfall along the southern Spanish Mediterranean

“…The A+F, TL, and CD weather types typically occurred in oriental zones (the S zone and the D area). The eastern zone shows similar weather type frequencies to other researches relating rainfall and weather type reported in the East of Spain, including Valencia (Rodrigo et al 2020). With the exception of Sierra Nevada (N), where NE-E winds and CD weather type were dominant for any rainfall intensity type, there was no clearly dominant wind direction explaining the rainfall intensity in any zone, although we note that there were no cases involving NW-N or SW-W winds (except in the D area).…”

Rainfall and water yield in Macizo del Caroig, Eastern Iberian Peninsula. Event runoff at plot scale during a rare flash flood at the Barranco de Benacancil

“…The importance of the runoff event of high intensity is usually a consequence of specific weather types as Nadal-Romero et al (2014) found. At the study sites Rodrigo Comino et al (2020) found that 60% of the runoff is due to the East winds, the ones from the Mediterranean Sea that contribute to wet and warm air masses. González-Hidalgo et al (2013) used 1800 catchments to be found that the contribution of the suspended sediment load at continental scale was dominated by the 25-largest daily events that delivered 46-63 % of the load, and the 5-largest daily events 23-39 %.…”