Welcome to Chinese Journal of Applied Ecology! Today is Share:

Chinese Journal of Applied Ecology ›› 2017, Vol. 28 ›› Issue (10): 3227-3234.doi: 10.13287/j.1001-9332.201710.011

Previous Articles     Next Articles

Effect of trampling disturbance on soil infiltration of biological soil crusts

SHI Ya-fang1,2, ZHAO Yun-ge2*, LI Chen-hui1,2, WANG Shan-shan1,2, YANG Qiao-yun1,2, XIE Shen-qi1,2   

  1. 1. College of Resources and Environment, Northwest A&F University,Yangling 712100, Shaanxi, China;
    2. State Key Laboratory of Soil Erosion and Dryland Farming on the Loess Plateau, Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Ministry of Water Resource, Yangling 712100, Shaanxi, China
  • Received:2016-12-23 Revised:2017-05-17 Online:2017-10-18 Published:2017-10-18
  • Supported by:

    This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation (41571268, 41271298).

PDF (PC)

154

Abstract: The effect of trampling disturbance on soil infiltration of biological soil crusts was investigated by using simulated rainfall. The results showed that the trampling disturbance significantly increased soil surface roughness. The increasing extent depended on the disturbance intensity. Soil surface roughness values at 50% disturbance increased by 91% compared with the undisturbed treatment. The runoff was delayed by trampling disturbance. A linear increase in the time of runoff yield was observed along with the increasing disturbance intensity within 20%-50%. The time of runoff yield at 50% disturbance increased by 169.7% compared with the undisturbed treatment. Trampling disturbance increased soil infiltration and consequently decreased the runoff coefficient. The cumulative infiltration amount at 50% disturbance increased by 12.6% compared with the undisturbed treatment. Soil infiltration significant decreased when biocrusts were removed. The cumulative infiltration of the treatment of biocrusts removal decreased by 30.2% compared with the undisturbed treatment. Trampling disturbance did not significantly increase the soil loss when the distur-bance intensity was lower than 50%, while the biocrusts removal resulted in 10 times higher in soil erosion modulus. The trampling disturbance of lower than 50% on biocrusts might improve soil infiltration and reduce the risk of runoff, thus might improve the soil moisture without obviously increa-sing the soil loss.