Author(s): Sang-Deog Park; Kyu-Song Lee; Chi-Hua Huang; Young-Ho Yoon; Seung-Sook Shin
Linked Author(s):
Keywords: Soil erosion; Vegetation coverage index; WEPP; Rainstorms; Dimensionless rainfall intensity factor; Forest fire
Abstract: Forest fires may suddenly change the environmental conditions in mountain slopes. Sudden hydrological changes on a burnt mountain may increase not only the rates of rainfall runoff and soil erosion by water, but also the risk of flood damage of the watershed. The objective of this paper is to evaluate the soil erosion from natural rainstorms in burnt mountain forests. For this research, forty-one plots on the slopes were established in east coast area of South Korea. The vegetation coverage index is used to quantify the change of vegetation structure in mountain forests. It has been confirmed that soil erosion of burnt mountain forests depend closely on this vegetation index. The lower the vegetation coverage index is, the more the sediment yield may be dependent on the dimensionless rainfall intensity factor sP for soil erosion. The observed results of soil erosion on slopes in burnt mountain forests are compared with predictions from the Water Erosion Prediction Project (WEPP). The WEPP model predicts very well the soil erosion on the slopes with the moderate vegetation coverage and rainstorms in burnt mountain forests. In the high vegetation coverage, however, the WEPP may overestimate or underestimate.
Year: 2005