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Romans who settled in the Low Countries at the northern margin of their empire were practicing diverse systems of water management to maintain economic and above all strategic stability. In the early Roman period (12BC–AD 70) they created a shipping route from the Rhine towards the north by digging canals and constructing dams, such as the Dam of Drusus, accompanied by the adjacent Roman fortress...
Deforestation and land-use change in tropics have increased over the past decades, driven by the demand for agricultural products. Although phosphorus (P) is one of the main limiting nutrients for agricultural productivity in the tropics, the effect of land-use change on P availability remains unclear. The objective was to assess the impacts of land-use change on soil inorganic and organic P fractions...
Regoliths encompass different materials from the fresh bedrock to the top of the organic horizons. The occurrence and evolution of these materials are determined by deposition, erosion and weathering processes that are specific for each region. The origin and interaction of the regolith layers are still important issues in the study of critical zone functioning. Studies that attempt to understand...
Desert varnish (or rock varnish) and soils of Jiroft area, south central Iran play a crucial role in the evolution of landforms in this arid setting containing mantled pediments, rock pediments, inselbergs, alluvial fans, alluvial plains, and flood plains. Mantled pediment contains three stable, semi-stable, and unstable surfaces as indicated by desert varnish and soil development properties. However,...
Anthropogenic changes during the past 2000years in the Teotihuacan Valley imply that intensity of soil degradation varies depending on the land management practices and the intensity of soil use. As a part of a broader effort to reconstruct erosion dynamics in the Teotihuacan Valley through geoarchaeological approaches, our study applies a process-based watershed hydrology and upland erosion model,...
Tropical alpine ecosystems serve vital roles in the areas of hydrology, biodiversity and carbon storage, due to their unique set of climatic and topographic conditions. These ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to climate change and anthropogenic influence as they exist in a fragile balance. Mount Kenya is an example of such a tropical alpine environment, and in 2012 a large fire burned through...
Objective of this study was to compare the effects of forest and herbaceous vegetation covers on soil temperatures (average daily maximum, minimum, and mean daily temperatures), soil moisture, and chemical content of the soil water. Soil moisture and soil temperature were monitored at three different soil depths (40, 80 and 120cm) and rain water samples and soil water samples from 40cm and 80cm soil...
The sedimentary records of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), mercury (Hg), arsenic (As), lead (Pb) and stable Pb isotopic ratios were studied in a sediment core collected from Shilianghe Reservoir in eastern China. Accumulations and distributions of these pollutants were measured in terms of PAHs concentrations, PAHs fluxes, and enrichment factor (EF) of Hg, As, Pb and Pb isotopic ratios. The...
A long-term field experiment was established in 1990 to evaluate the impact of mineral fertilizer (N and NPK) and organic material (manure and crop residues) application on soil aggregation and organic carbon (C) accumulation in an intensively cultivated grey desert soil in northwestern China. The long-term addition of organic materials with balanced inorganic NPK inputs significantly increased the...
High temperatures and rainfall prevail in the Brazilian Amazon, but some areas have soils with high clay mineral contents of 2:1, and there is limited information concerning their properties. Therefore, it is important to study the soil formation and understand the environmental conditions in which they were formed. This study aimed to investigate the physical, chemical and mineralogical properties...
This study utilizes features of calcrete to elucidate the main environmental factors that affect its formation and distribution in the Tensift Al Haouz area, Central Morocco, one of semi arid regions where calcrete is ubiquitous and occurs in a variety of forms. More than hundred calcretes profiles were examined and described by field observations. Selected samples were analyzed by optical microscopy...
In order to investigate the influence of the litter layer and undergrowth intercrops on surface runoff and soil erosion, experimental field plots were monitored over one rainy season in a rubber monoculture and a rubber/tea agroforestry system. Results indicated that the cumulative runoff from plots with bare soil was 1.7 and 2.3 times higher than plots with a litter layer, and with a litter layer...
Studies on the mineral stabilization of soil organic carbon (SOC) and the radiocarbon age of Pyrenean mountain soils have not been conducted to date. This study assessed the SOC concentrations, the interaction of SOC with the mineral phase (stabilization), the radiocarbon age and the relationships between SOC and dithionite-, oxalate-, and pyrophosphate-extractable Fe, Al and Si contents on four summits...
A modelling framework with field-scale models including the preferential flow model MACRO was developed to simulate transport of six contrasting herbicides in a 650km2 catchment in eastern England. The catchment scale model SPIDER was also used for comparison. The catchment system was successfully simulated as the sum of multiple field-scale processes with little impact of in-stream processes on simulations...
Up till now, the effect of topography on soils has usually been studied in mountainous areas, and any reference to relatively small-scale lowland landforms such as inland dunes has not been thus far recognized in any great detail. We investigated the effect of land relief on morphology and the properties of soils in a comparative study covering two ecosystem types (a production forest and a naturally...
Digital soil mapping (DSM) relies on statistical relationships between soil properties and covariates (e.g. terrain attributes, land use class, geology) which may not explain a large proportion of measured soil properties variability. This uncertainty combined with low spatial resolution of existing maps makes it difficult to monitor soils. Diffuse reflectance infrared Fourier transform mid-infrared...
The electromagnetic induction (EMI) technique has been widely used to survey soil properties at intermediate spatial scales. However, EMI data interpretation remains a challenge for more accurate and robust mapping. Residual analysis is an alternative approach that can be used to improve the EMI data mining. On a tea garden (TG) hillslope and a bamboo forest (BF) hillslope, terrain indices were used...
It is unlikely that natural vegetation growth induced soil suction can be predicted deterministically. Probabilistic approach may be an ideal tool to analyse effects of evapotranspiration (ET) induced suction by vegetation, which are commonly found on slopes. Most of the previous deterministic studies quantifying suction are carried out on natural slopes, which are heterogeneous in nature. The main...
The interactions between deep-rooted grass patches and soil hydrological processes are unclear. This study used the deep-rooted grass Achnatherum splendens as an indicator plant to evaluate the relationship between spatial distributions of A. splendens patches and dynamics of soil water and salt using electromagnetic induction (EMI) methods in Qinghai Lake watershed on Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in northwestern...
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