L. Mathier et Ag. Roy, A STUDY ON THE EFFECT OF SPATIAL SCALE ON THE PARAMETERS OF A SEDIMENT TRANSPORT-EQUATION FOR SHEETWASH, Catena, 26(3-4), 1996, pp. 161-169
Event-based prediction of soil erosion over large agricultural fields
and drainage basins is limited by the lack of data for the relevant sc
ales of applications. Thus, researchers have to assume that the parame
ters of the sediment transport equation obtained from very small scale
can be transferred to large scale systems. This assumption remains un
tested. The objectives of this paper are: (1) to illustrate, by a comp
ilation of a wide range of experiments on sheetwash erosion, the lack
of investigations conducted on an event by event basis over agricultur
al fields; (2) to present a synthesis of results obtained during three
experiments conducted for short duration events at various spatial sc
ales ranging from 0.25 to 55 meters. The results will show the possibi
lity of using a relation calibrated for a small scale experimental plo
t on a larger scale agricultural field under specific conditions.