Soil erosion by tillage
(Monitoring frequency: once a year)
Soil erosion by tillage is a strong element of degradation of soil when produced by deep tillage and in steep slopes. The soil redistribution and erosion/deposition pattern produced by tillage operations cause strong evidences of net soil erosion (upper field border, longitudinal field border, areas close to electricity and telephone poles inside the field) and deposition (lower field border). The degree of severity of tillage erosion can be assessed in the field using well established techniques (Borselli et al. 2002, De alba et al. 2006) and under some circumstance a soil translocation rate (and its dependence from local slope gradient) may be evaluated knowing the height of soil erosion by tillage monuments (evidences around electricity and telephone poles in the middle of the field) or height of linear structures (Borselli et al. 2002). This information will allow, during a field survey campaign dedicated to this theme, to identify the most affected areas, the measurement of soil erosion evidences. The planned survey (with 1 year frequency at the end of summer -beginning of autumn) will allow the completion of the survey in two years. During this survey a set of most important affected areas will be measured in details and the development of basic relationships amount of erosion rate and slope gradient - curvature will allow assessment of the distribution of soil erosion by tillage in the arable land of the basin.
