Water Erosion

 What is water erosion?

When water removes the top layer of the soil, eventually causing economic and physical impacts deteriorating the soil conditions, that process is called water erosion. Different forms of water, such as snowmelt, runoff, irrigation, rainfall can caused the water erosion, but the major causal agent considered is the rainfall for the water erosion. 

Rainfall causes the soil erosion in multiple steps:

- splash erosion: rain drops bombard the exposed land, destructing the structure of the top layer; it forms the surface crusts. and results in the runoff formation.

- sheet erosion: when rainfall intensity is greater than the soil infiltration ability it results in the sheet erosion. the soil loses the finest sol particles and nutrients

- rill erosion: faster flowing channels are formed, the channels can be 30 cm deep and detaches the soil particles and transports. 

- gully erosion: it is an advanced stage where the rills even become deeper than 0.3 m, and the tillage operations are not of any help, sediments loads are heavier

- tunnel erosion: series of tunnel below the soil which is not visible to the eye. 

Remedies:

- maintaining the vegetative cover

- enriching the soil with OM

- reducing the water flow speed, and improving the irrigation practices,

- measurement and maintenance of soil moisture during tillage,

- using contours, drainage systems, and bioengineering operations