Determination of the variation of hydraulic conductivity with depth in drained lands and the design of drainage installations

Abstract

For lands drained by ditches dug to a horizontal impermeable floor, the variation of the soil's hydraulic conductivity with depth may be obtained from the relationship between water-table height and drain-outflow rate. Some relationships obtained on an experimental plot on a clay soil, drained by tile drains with gravel backfill, and on another in the same field which was mole-drained, were analysed to give the variation of hydraulic conductivity with depth by assuming that their performances approximated to that of ditches. For the tile-drained plot, the hydraulic conductivity value increased by three orders of magnitude near the bottom of the plough layer; this was reduced in a subsequent year when the field was uncultivated under grass with consequent higher water tables. The mole-drained soil was more permeable than the tile-drained soil at a lower depth, and its hydraulic conductivity at this lower depth did not change in the subsequent year when the field was uncultivated. An assumed uniform hydraulic conductivity value, calculated using drainage theory and matching at one water-table height, gave relationships between water-table height and drain outflow which did not agree with observations.A general hydraulic approach to drainage design is suggested whereby the drainage from an investigational area may be used to measure the hydraulic conductivity variation with depth and to design the correct drainage scheme for a predicted stress period of rainfall. Even if the drainage rate from an area is not measured, the water-table recession alone in an area drained by ditches may give sufficient information to design a drainage system on a rational physical basis.