Skip to main content
ARS Home » Pacific West Area » Pullman, Washington » Northwest Sustainable Agroecosystems Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #117717
Title: DETERMINING ERODIBILITY PARAMETERS FOR A PALOUSE SILT LOAM USING RUNOFF PLOT DATA

Author
item BROOKS, ERIN - UNIVERSITY OF IDAHO
item McCool, Donald
item BOLL, JAN - UNIVERSITY OF IDAHO

Submitted to: ASAE Annual International Meeting
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: 4/2/2000
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: Complete and accurate site specific climate and soil information is needed to apply and test the Water Erosion Prediction Project (WEPP) and other models to the highly erodible loess soils of the Palouse Region of south- east Washington, northern Idaho, and north-central Oregon. Without an adequate data set for testing, the performance of the models for designing crop and land management systems in this region is in question. Seven years of plot data on continuous bare fallow plots will be used determine erodibility parameters for the WEPP and Rose models. This will help select the most appropriate model for use in the region.

Technical Abstract: Site specific parameters for winter conditions (e.g., snowmelt, rain on frozen soil) are needed to apply the shear stress based Water Erosion Prediction Project (WEPP) model or the stream power theory of Rose to the highly erosive loess soils in the Palouse region of the Pacific Northwest. Seven years of plot data on continuous bare fallow plots are used to determine the rill erodibility parameter (kr) used in the WEPP model and the erodibility parameter (?) used in the stream power theory of Rose (1993). A sensitivity analysis quantifies the error associated with the assumptions in the methodology.