An experiment was set-up to investigate the adjustment of turbulence o
ver a roughness transition (moorland to forest). Results from this exp
eriment support the development of an internal boundary layer (IBL) at
the transition, which propagates upwards by turbulent diffusion as a
function of distance downwind from the transition. Spectra and length-
scale results uphold the hypothesis that, over a transition to a rough
surface, the variance distribution shifts towards smaller wavelengths
/length scales. However, results suggest that the adjustment of stream
wise velocity variance may be faster than the adjustment of the vertic
al velocity variance. The concept of an equilibrium layer developing a
bove the new surface is supported. Fetch requirements for equilibrium
are, however, found to differ between first order and second order (fl
ux) statistics, with second order statistics requiring a longer fetch.
Results indicate that fetch should exceed 25 times the height of the
measurement above the zero plane, which is a 2 degrees (+/-0.5) gro2th
angle, for flux equilibrium.