Effects of Residue Cover on Infiltration Process of the Black Soil Under Rainfall Simulations

Yan Xin,Yun Xie,Yuxin Liu

doi:10.3390/w11122593

Abstract

Residue cover is widely used for soil conservation after crop harvesting in the black soil region of the Northeastern China, which influences infiltration. It is necessary to optimize infiltration models for accurate predictions under bare and residue cover slope conditions. Rainfall simulation experiments were conducted to quantify the infiltration for the black soil under four rainfall intensities (30, 60, 90, and 120 mm/h), five residue coverage controls (15%, 35%, 55%, 75%, and bare slope), and two soil moisture (8% and approximately 30%) conditions. The observed data were used to fit and compare four infiltration models by Kostiakov, Mein and Larson (short for GAML, a modification of GreenAmpt model made by Mein and Larson), Horton, and Philip under the bare slope conditions. The residue cover infiltration factor (RCFi) was derived to predict the infiltration under the residue cover slopes, which was defined as the ratio of infiltration from residue-covered soil to that from bare soil. The results showed that the newly derived equation coupling the Philip model with the RCFi was the most accurate way of predicting the cumulative infiltration of black soil under various residue covers, and could be applied to the black soil region for residue cover infiltration predictions.

Highlights

Infiltration is the process of water entering soil from the soil surface [1,2]
Numerous models have been proposed for vertically homogeneous soils with constant initial soil water content and flow over horizontal surfaces for infiltration estimations [5,6], including physically-based models and empirical models [7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14]
The average values of two repeated trials were used for the infiltration rate curves for different rainfall intensities and soil moistures of the black soil (Figure 3)

Summary

Introduction

Infiltration is the process of water entering soil from the soil surface [1,2]. This process is one of the most important components in the hydrological cycle and is related to many environmental problems and soil erosion [3]. Numerous models have been proposed for vertically homogeneous soils with constant initial soil water content and flow over horizontal surfaces for infiltration estimations [5,6], including physically-based models and empirical models [7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14]. These models have limited applicability under complex initial factors. The aforementioned models should be modified and improved based on a variety of scenarios to obtain the most accurate infiltration estimations

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion