Site Implementation Plan: Macao and Gois, Portugal

Table of Contents

1. Site Information
2. Summary
3. Site 1 (Caratão catchment)
4. Site 2 (Vale Torto catchment)
5. Site 3 (Camelo catchment)
6. Site 4 (Moinhos catchment)
7. Stakeholder information
8. Land use
9. Conservation measures and experimental setup
10. Monitoring activities
    1. One-off measurements
    2. Meteorological data
    3. Hydrological data
    4. Rainfall simulations
    5. Repeat-photography of ground surface
    6. Repeated measurements (2 weekly/ monthly):
    7. Agronomic activities by stakeholder
    8. Yield assessment

Repeated measurements (2 weekly/ monthly):

• Erosion has been monitored prior to as well as following the prescribed fire event using sediment fences. These fences were installed at four strategic locations on the hillslopes in Vale Torto. These have been cleared of sediment on six occasions before and eight occasions after fire to date (October 2009). A further three fences were installed after fire to take advantage of additional suitable locations The weir is also working as a fence. At Camelo, one sediment fence was installed immediately after the wildfire in July 2008. The sediments have been emptied 11 times from this sediment fence to date. At Moinhos, erosion pins and sediment fences have been installed.
• Nutrient losses will be assessed by sampling (1) runoff at the catchment gauging station during high flow (from sample bottles mounted on a stake positioned in the basin behind the v-notch weir), and (2) from eroded sediment collected from the sediment fences.
• Rainfall simulations are being carried out at intervals after prescribed and wild fire respectively at Sites 2 and 3. The plots have been installed close to each of the original sediment fences in Vale Torto and at representative sites at the Camelo site. Following installation of the simulation plots and the simulation experiments prior to the fire, the plots have been left in place but the upslope and downslope ends removed so that slope processes have been interrupted as little as possible. To date (April 2009), in Vale Torto, simulations have been carried out twice before fire (in dry and wet antecedent conditions) and two times after fire. At the Camelo site, rainfall simulations have been carried out two times at all the plots. Further simulations will be carried out to reflect the response of processes to sediment exhaustion and vegetation recovery in the post-fire period.
• The Vale Torto site benefits from having had a small bounded plot (8 x 2 m) installed since the late 1990s to one side of the catchment in essentially the same shrub vegetation type, although under pinus trees. In addition, there is a subcatchment weir pool in the catchment itself. The amount of sediment collected from this plot and accumulated in the weir pool provide a long-term view of erosion in unburnt terrain in the locality. To date, both were emptied of sediment at the first emptying of the sediment fences (representing 10 years of sediment accumulation) and on each occasion that the sediment fences have been emptied since then.
• Fire breaks: This is a technique intended to halt/limit the progress of fire across the landscape. In some cases, fire breaks in central Portugal are made by bulldozing the vegetation and leaving the soil bare. This is potentially a highly degradational procedure, which will be monitored. Sediment fences will be used to assess erosion and repeat observations will be used to determine the speed of recovery of the vegetation. Rainfall simulations will be carried out on the fire break. The precise number will depend on what is feasible. In addition, small pre-manufactured flumes will be places at the outlets of the fire breaks (i.e. their drainage outlets), in order to quantify the amount of water and sediments that flow from defined fire break areas.