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Changes in daily and monthly rainfall in the Middle Yellow River, China

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Abstract

Highly concentrated precipitation, where a large percentage of annual precipitation occurs over a few days, may include a high risk of flooding and severe soil erosion. Thus, areas with severe erosion such as the Loess Plateau in China are particularly vulnerable to highly concentrated precipitation events due to climate change. In this study, we investigated spatial and temporal patterns in the concentration of rainfall in the Middle Yellow River (MYR) from the last 56 years (1958–2013). We used daily and monthly precipitation data from 26 meteorological stations in the study area to calculate the precipitation concentration index (PCI) and the concentration index (CI). The southern and northern parts of the MYR were characterized by a lower CI with a decreasing trend, while the middle parts had a higher CI with an increasing trend. High PCI values occurred in the southern MYR, while lower PCIs with a more homogenous rainfall distribution were found mainly in the northern parts of the MYR. The annual PCI and CI exhibited positive trends at most stations, although only a minority of stations had significant trends (P < 0.05). At seasonal scales, CI exhibited significantly increasing trends in winter at most stations, while a few stations had significant trends in the other three seasons. These findings provide important reference information to facilitate ecological restoration and farming operations in the study region.

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by the National Science Foundation of China (41271295 and 41371277), the Governmental Public Industry Research Special Funds for Projects, Ministry of Water Resources, China (201501049), and the Key Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (KZZD-EW-04). The authors are grateful to Prof. Zhang Qiang from Sun Yat-Sen University by providing the MATLAB code for analyzing the CI index.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Water Resources and Architectural Engineering, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, Shaanxi, 712100, China

    Yi He & Xingmin Mu

  2. College of Natural Resources and Environment, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, Shaanxi, 712100, China

    Peng Tian

  3. Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, Shaanxi, 712100, China

    Xingmin Mu, Peng Gao, Guangju Zhao & Fei Wang

  4. Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Ministry of Water Resources, Yangling, Shaanxi, 712100, China

    Xingmin Mu, Peng Gao, Guangju Zhao, Fei Wang & Pengfei Li

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  1. Yi He
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  2. Peng Tian
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  3. Xingmin Mu
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  4. Peng Gao
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  5. Guangju Zhao
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Correspondence to Peng Tian.

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He, Y., Tian, P., Mu, X. et al. Changes in daily and monthly rainfall in the Middle Yellow River, China. Theor Appl Climatol 129, 139–148 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-016-1763-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-016-1763-4

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