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Spatiotemporal distribution of rainfall erosivity in the Yanhe River watershed of hilly and gully region, Chinese Loess Plateau

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Abstract

Rainfall erosivity is considered as one of the most important factors in the universal soil loss equation (USLE) or its revised form (RUSLE); it can directly reflect the potential of soil erosion caused by rainfall. In this study, the simple algorithms of rainfall erosivity including the Wischmeier model and the half-month model are selected and used to estimate rainfall erosivity values from 1971 to 2013 in the Yanhe River watershed of the hilly and gully region, Chinese Loess Plateau. Results demonstrate that: (1) the applicability of the simple algorithms of rainfall erosivity in loess hilly and gully region is good and the half-month model is more suitable for the Yanhe River watershed; (2) the overall variations of annual rainfall erosivity values estimated by the two models are similar and show a decreased trend during the relatively steady rainfall period from 1971 to 2012; but they will have a certain degree of deviation for the extreme rainfall with high intensity and short duration in 2013; the monthly variations of rainfall erosivity within a year are highly concentrated in 5–10 months, the rainfall erosivity in other months are almost zero; (3) the spatial distributions of the rainfall erosivity have strong correlation with the erosive rainfall, precipitation and rainfall erosivity which both present an increasing trend from northwest to southeast in the Yanhe River watershed; the central and southern regions both have the highest rainfall and the most serious erosivity; and both rainfall and erosivity in southeast are more serious than that in northwest of the watershed. Results may provide scientific theoretical guidance and data support for soil loss management of the hilly and gully region, Chinese Loess Plateau.

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Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to the anonymous reviewers for their many helpful suggestions which improved the original manuscript. This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (51309194), the open foundation of State Key Laboratory, Institute of Water and Soil Conservation, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Ministry of Water Resources (K318009902-1417), the Doctoral Fund of Ministry of Education of China (20130204120034), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (QN2013047), and the Initial Scientific Research Funds for PhD from Northwest A&F University (2012BSJJ004).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Soil Erosion and Dryland Farming on the Loess Plateau, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, Xianyang, 712100, Shaanxi, People’s Republic of China

    Lei Wu

  2. College of Water Resources and Architectural Engineering, Northwest A&F University, No. 23 Weihui Road, Yangling, Xianyang, 712100, Shaanxi, People’s Republic of China

    Lei Wu & Xiao-yi Ma

  3. Key Laboratory of Agricultural Soil and Water Engineering in Arid Regions, Ministry of Education, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, Xianyang, 712100, Shaanxi, People’s Republic of China

    Lei Wu & Xiao-yi Ma

  4. Construction Department, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, Xianyang, 712100, Shaanxi, People’s Republic of China

    Xia Liu

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  1. Lei Wu
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Correspondence to Lei Wu.

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Wu, L., Liu, X. & Ma, Xy. Spatiotemporal distribution of rainfall erosivity in the Yanhe River watershed of hilly and gully region, Chinese Loess Plateau. Environ Earth Sci 75, 315 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-015-5136-6

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