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Multitemporal Monitoring of Land Degradation Risk Due to Soil Loss in a Fire-Prone Mediterranean Landscape Using Multi-decadal Landsat Imagery

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Abstract

Natural, as well as human-induced, landscape changes may have profound effects on soil-loss rates in Mediterranean countries. Knowledge of the spatial and temporal distribution of the erosion processes from 1984 to 2013 across the fire-prone island of Thassos was gained on the basis of a joint analysis of imagery received from three generations of Landsat satellites. Soil loss was modeled using the revised universal soil loss equation. With the exception of the crop management factor, which was estimated through the NDVI image series, rainfall erosivity, soil erodibility, and topographic factor, were compiled within a GIS environment and used for the production of the spatio-temporal erosion maps. We found some constant patterns regarding the spatial distribution of soil susceptibility to erosion, similar to the findings of plot scale studies in the Mediterranean, as well as major changes related to the temporal intensity of the process. With regard to the aspect, we found that the most erosion-prone areas diachronically were the south-facing slopes. The highest altitudinal zone was most at soil-loss risk, but this elevation zone occupies the smallest spatial extent compared to the others. We observed a major increase for all the elevation and aspect zones, as well for every watershed of the island, during 1984–1991, when Thassos experienced some catastrophic fires. Between 1984 and 2013, all but one the watersheds of the island experienced a severe increase in soil erosion, suggesting the need for prevention measures and restoration plans that specifically target the areas most vulnerable to degradation. Quantification of the soil loss over large areas and large time extents, can contribute to an understanding of the process, highlight drivers of change and assist in the implementation of erosion control measures and decision making.

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Acknowledgments

Landsat TM, ETM+ and OLI data used were available at no-cost from the US Geological Survey. We would like to thank the Associate Editor and the 2 anonymous reviewers whose insightful comments helped to substantially improve this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Forest Remote Sensing, Department of Forestry and Management of the Environment and Natural Resources, Democritus University of Thrace, Orestiada, Greece

    Giorgos Mallinis & Georgios Tasionas

  2. Laboratory of Forest Management and Remote Sensing, Department of Forestry and Natural Environment, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece

    Ioannis Z. Gitas

  3. Laboratory of Mountainous Watersheds and Risk Management, Department of Forestry and Management of the Environment and Natural Resources, Democritus University of Thrace, Orestiada, Greece

    Fotis Maris

Authors
  1. Giorgos Mallinis
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  2. Ioannis Z. Gitas
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  3. Georgios Tasionas
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  4. Fotis Maris
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Giorgos Mallinis.

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The manuscript has not been submitted to more than one journal for simultaneous consideration. The manuscript has not been published previously (partly or in full), unless the new work concerns an expansion of previous work. This study is not split up into several parts to increase the quantity of submissions and submitted to various journals or to one journal over time.

No data have been fabricated or manipulated (including images) to support the conclusions. No data, text, or theories by others are presented as if they were the author’s own. Proper acknowledgements to other works is given, quotation marks are used for verbatim copying of material, and permissions are secured for material that is copyrighted.

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Highlights

• This study presents spatial and temporal changes of soil loss in a Mediterranean fire prone landscape and its linkages with wildfire impacts and human-induced disturbances.

• Due to their subtle differences, vegetation indices derived from different Landsat satellites were used complementary for the temporal study of the phenomenon. following correction of atmospheric and cross-sensor inconsistencies.

• The soil loss is more evident in south facing slopes and steep gradients similar to the findings of plot-scale studies in Mediterranean areas.

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Mallinis, G., Gitas, I.Z., Tasionas, G. et al. Multitemporal Monitoring of Land Degradation Risk Due to Soil Loss in a Fire-Prone Mediterranean Landscape Using Multi-decadal Landsat Imagery. Water Resour Manage 30, 1255–1269 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-016-1224-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-016-1224-y

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