Evaluation of soil erosion risk and identification of soil cover and management factor (C) for RUSLE in European vineyards with different soil management

Marcella Biddoccu (1) , Gema Guzman (1) , G. Capello (1) , T. Thielke (2) , Peter Strauss (2) , Silvia Winter (3) , J. G. Zaller (3) , Annegret Nicolai (4, 5) , Daniel Cluzeau (4, 5) , Daniele Popescu , Claudiu Bunea (6) , Adela Hoble (6) , E. Cavallo (1) , José A. Gomez (1)

1 CSIC - Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas [España] = Spanish National Research Council [Spain]
2 Institute for land and water management research
3 BOKU - Universität für Bodenkultur Wien = University of Natural Resources and Life [Vienne, Autriche]
4 ECOBIO - Ecosystèmes, biodiversité, évolution [Rennes]
5 OSUR - Station Biologique de Paimpont CNRS UMR 6653
6 University of Agricultural Sciences and Veterinary Medicine Cluj Napoca = Universitatea de Științe Agricole și Medicină Veterinară Cluj-Napoca

Vineyards show some of the largest erosion rates reported in agricultural areas in Europe. Reported rates vary considerably under the same land use, since erosion processes are highly affected by climate, soil, topography and by the adopted soil management practices. Literature also shows differences in the effect of same conservation practices on reducing soil erosion from conventional, bare soil based, management. The Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE) is commonly adopted to estimate rates of water erosion on cropland under different forms of land use and management, but it requires proper value of soil cover and management (C) factors in order to obtain a reliable evaluation of local soil erosion rates. In this study the ORUSCAL (Orchard RUSle CALibration) is used to identify the best calibration strategy against long-term experimental data. Afterwards, ORUSCAL is used in order to apply the RUSLE technology from farm based information across different European wine-growing regions. The results suggest that the best strategy for calibration should incorporate the soil moisture sub-factor (S-m) to provide better soil loss predictions. The C factor, whose average values ranged from 0.012 to 0.597, presented a large spatial variability due to coupling with local climate and specific local management. The comparison across the five wine-growing regions indicates that for the soil protection management, permanent cover crop is the best measure for accomplishing sustainable erosion rates across the studied areas. Alternate and temporary cover crops, that are used in areas of limited water resources to prevent competition with vines, failed to achieve sustainable erosion rates, that still need to be addressed. This raises the need for a careful use of C values developed under different environmental conditions. (C) 2020 International Research and Training Center on Erosion and Sedimentation and China Water and Power Press. Production and Hosting by Elsevier B.V.

Mots clés: Vineyard; Erosion; Soil management; RUSLE; Europe

Domaines: Sciences de l'environnement

Marcella Biddoccu, Gema Guzman, G. Capello, T. Thielke, Peter Strauss, et al.. Evaluation of soil erosion risk and identification of soil cover and management factor (C) for RUSLE in European vineyards with different soil management. International Soil and Water Conservation Research, 2020, 8 (4), pp.337-353. ⟨10.1016/j.iswcr.2020.07.003⟩. ⟨hal-03105866⟩