Laboratory Studies on the Influence of Rainfall Pattern on Rill Erosion and Its Runoff and Sediment Characteristics

Abstract

AbstractRill is a major type of erosion on upland slopes. Continuous rainfall is commonly used in laboratory studies on rill erosion despite the fact the rainfall was often discontinuous in the field; this is particularly true in the Chinese Loess Plateau. This study compares rill erosion under continuous and intermittent rainfalls by using laboratory experiments. The experiments include two rainfall‐intensity treatments (90 and 120 mm h−1) and two rainfall‐pattern treatments (continuous and intermittent). The results indicate that rill formation had a significant effect on runoff and sediment concentration. For continuous and intermittent rainfall at the rainfall intensity of 90 mm h−1, the mean sediment concentrations were 1·91 and 1·73 times after rill initiation than those before rill initiation, respectively, and the rill erosion accounted for 75·5% and 77·7% of runoff duration, respectively. For continuous and intermittent rainfall at the rainfall intensity of 120 mm h−1, the mean sediment concentrations after rill initiation were 1·38 and 1·32 times that those before rill initiation, respectively, and the rill erosion represented 88·7% and 78·8% of the total runoff duration, respectively. We observed sediment sorting under all treatments; however, the low rainfall intensity boosted but the high rainfall intensity lowered the clay fraction; in contrast, the sorting remained roughly the same between the rainfall‐pattern treatments. The runoff velocity also affected the sediment sorting. Our empirical results indicated the important significance of the rainfall intermittence in predicting rill erosion. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.