Soil Moisture Characteristics of a Typical Slope in the Watershed of the Loess Plateau for Gully Land Consolidation Project

¹ Key Laboratory of Eco-hydraulic Engineering in Northwest Dry Area of Shaanxi Province, Xi’an University of Technology, 710048, Xi’an, China
² Shaanxi Provincial Land Engineering Construction Group Co., Ltd., Xi’an 710075, China

^* Corresponding author: sxdjsyl@163.com

Abstract

To clarify the characteristics of soil moisture in the slope of watershed of the gully land consolidation watershed, and to further guide the implementation of the gully land consolidation project and vegetation restoration in this area, this study selected a typical slope of gully land consolidation watershed as the research object. The soil moisture of different slope positions was monitored and analyzed, and its temporal stability was analyzed. The results showed that: 1) The average soil moisture of different slope positions increased with the increase of soil depth, and the variability showed an increasing-decreasing-increasing trend, and the variability was the smallest at about 70 cm from the surface with weak variability, and the soil moisture variability in other layers is moderate. 2) On the slope, the distribution characteristics of soil moisture content were as follows: upslope <middleslope <downslope position. The differences of soil moisture between the upslope and downslope, midslope and downslope were significant. 3) The temporal stability analysis of the soil moisture showed that there is high stability between August and September of the soil moisture of the 0-50 cm and the correlation is extremely significant, while the soil moisture content of 50-100 cm range has a significant correlation between May and June. 4) The time stability of soil moisture in the middle slope position is the highest, followed by the upslope position, and the time stability in the downslope position is the lowest. 5) The best time stability point in the study area is the M3 point of the middle slope.