Effects of soil conservation practices on soil erosion and the size selectivity of eroded sediment on cultivated slopes

Soil conservation practices can greatly affect the soil erosion process,but limited information is available about its influence on the particle size distribution(PSD)of eroded sediment,especially under natural rainfall.In this study,the runoff,sediment yields,and effective/ultimate PSD were measured under two conventional tillage practices,downhill ridge tillage(DT)and plat tillage(PT)and three soil conservation practices,contour ridge tillage(CT),mulching with downhill ridge tillage(MDT),and mulching with contour ridge tillage(MCT)during 21 natural rainfall events in the lower Jinsha River.The results showed that(1)soil conservation practices had a significant effect on soil erosion.The conventional tillage of DT caused highest runoff depth(0.58 to 29.13 mm)and sediment yield(0.01 to 3.19 t hm^(-2)).Compared with DT,the annual runoff depths and sediment yields of CT,MDT and MCT decreased by 12.24%-49.75%and 40.79%-88.30%,respectively.(2)Soil conservation practices can reduce the decomposition of aggregates in sediments.The ratios of effective and ultimate particle size(E/U)of siltand sand-sized particles of DT and PT plots were close to 1,indicating that they were transported as primary particles,however,values lower/greater than 1 subject to CT,MDT and MCT plots indicated they were transported as aggregates.The ratios of E/U of claysized particles were all less than 1 independently of tillage practices.(3)The sediments of soil conservation practices were more selective than those of conventional tillage practices.For CT,MDT and MCT plots,the average enrichment ratios(ERs)of clay,silt and sand were 1.99,1.93 and 0.42,respectively,with enrichment of clay and silt and depletion of sand in sediments.However,the compositions of the eroded sediments of DT and PT plots were similar to that of the original soil.These findings support the use of both effective and ultimate particle size distributions for studying the size selectivity of eroded sediment,and provide a scientific basis for revealing the erosion mechanism in the purple soil area of China.

Soil particle size distribution and its relationship with soil water and salt under mulched drip irrigation in Xinjiang of China

Soil particle size distribution(PSD),one of the most important soil physical attributes,is of great importance to soil water movement,soil erosion and soil solute migration.In this study,the soil PSD of 563 soil samples from the mulched drip irrigated cotton fields in Xinjiang of China were measured by laser diffraction particle size analyzer.The soil PSD characteristics and its relations with soil water and salt were studied by using the combined methods of textural triangle,fractal and multifractal analysis.The results showed very low clay content(about 1.52%) while really high sand content of the studied soil,and a complex shape of bimodal or unimodal of soil PSD.The results also showed that the two indices,i.e.,standard deviation and the peak value of soil particle relative volumes,were good indicators of soil PSD and thus had good relations with fractal and multifractal characteristics.The correlative analysis further indicated that the mulched drip irrigation had a significant impact on the distribution of the soil salt,while this impact withered for the deeper soil layer.The soil texture feature was found to dominate soil water and salt distribution,especially the surface soil salt content and the deep soil water content.

Unraveling the size distributions of surface properties for purple soil and yellow soil

Soils contain diverse colloidal particles whose properties are pertinent to ecological and human health, whereas few investigations systematically analyze the surface properties of these particles. The objective of this study was to elucidate the surface properties of particles within targeted size ranges（i.e. 〉 10, 1-10, 0.5-1, 0.2-0.5 and 〈 0.2 μm） for a purple soil（Entisol） and a yellow soil（Ultisol） using the combined determination method. The mineralogy of corresponding particle-size fractions was determined by X-ray diffraction.We found that up to 80% of the specific surface area and 85% of the surface charge of the entire soil came from colloidal-sized particles（〈 1 μm）, and almost half of the specific surface area and surface charge came from the smallest particles（〈 0.2 μm）. Vermiculite,illite, montmorillonite and mica dominated in the colloidal-sized particles, of which the smallest particles had the highest proportion of vermiculite and montmorillonite. For a given size fraction, the purple soil had a larger specific surface area, stronger electrostatic field, and higher surface charge than the yellow soil due to differences in mineralogy.Likewise, the differences in surface properties among the various particle-size fractions can also be ascribed to mineralogy. Our results indicated that soil surface properties were essentially determined by the colloidal-sized particles, and the 〈 0.2 μm nanoparticles made the largest contribution to soil properties. The composition of clay minerals within the diverse particle-size fractions could fully explain the size distributions of surface properties.