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Soil and Water Conservation in Rainfed Vineyards with Different Plant Covers: Common Sainfoin and Spontaneous Vegetation under Different Physiographic Conditions
Ben-Salem, N.; Álvarez, S.; López-Vicente, M. Soil and Water Conservation in Rainfed Vineyards with Common Sainfoin and Spontaneous Vegetation under Different Ground Conditions. Water2018, 10, 1058.
Ben-Salem, N.; Álvarez, S.; López-Vicente, M. Soil and Water Conservation in Rainfed Vineyards with Common Sainfoin and Spontaneous Vegetation under Different Ground Conditions. Water 2018, 10, 1058.
Ben-Salem, N.; Álvarez, S.; López-Vicente, M. Soil and Water Conservation in Rainfed Vineyards with Common Sainfoin and Spontaneous Vegetation under Different Ground Conditions. Water2018, 10, 1058.
Ben-Salem, N.; Álvarez, S.; López-Vicente, M. Soil and Water Conservation in Rainfed Vineyards with Common Sainfoin and Spontaneous Vegetation under Different Ground Conditions. Water 2018, 10, 1058.
Abstract
Soil erosion seriously affects vineyards. In this study, the influence of two plant covers on soil moisture and the effect of different physiographic conditions on runoff and sediment yields were evaluated in a rainfed vineyard formed by four fields (NE Spain) during 15 months. One field had spontaneous vegetation as plant cover and three fields had a cover crop of common sainfoin. The vineyards’ rows were dry and stable, whereas the inter-row areas were wet although very variable, and the corridors were wet and very stable. Soil moisture in the inter-row areas with Common sainfoin was much higher than in the rows (62% - 70%) whereas this difference was lower with spontaneous vegetation (40%). Two runoff and sediment traps (STs) were installed in two ephemeral gullies, and 26 time-integrated surveys (TIS) done. The mean and maximum runoff yields were 9.8 and 30.7 l TIS–1 in ST2 and 13.5 and 30.2 l TIS–1 in ST3. The mean turbidity was 333 and 19 g l–1, and the maximum sediment yields were 41,260 and 2,778 g TIS–1 in ST2 and ST3. Changes in the canopy covers (grapevines and plant covers) and rainfall parameters explained the runoff and sediment dynamics.
Keywords
cover crop; spontaneous vegetation; vineyard; topsoil water content; soil erosion; runoff coefficient; sediment trap; temporal stability; Mediterranean region
Subject
Environmental and Earth Sciences, Environmental Science
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
