Water erosion
Water erosion is a part of soil erosion process in which water is an erosive force in soil detachment and transport. It finally provides to setting of sediment at footslopes and valley floors or direct delivery of sediment to water courses or reservoirs. During the first phase of water erosion, the impact of raindrops causes soil crusting, that is, limits infiltration and leads to development of runoff, initially in the form of laminar flow and with increase of its depth and velocity – turbulent flow. The change of flow nature is reflected in separation of water erosion into sheet, rill, and gully (ephemeral and permanent). Dynamics of the process is ruled by energy input (rainfall amount and intensity, shear stress of overland flow) and resistance of soil and landscape features. The latter is changing with rainfall duration, providing higher connectivity of the flow system (surface, subsurface) to transport water and sediment during present and next events. Water erosion...
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Rejman, J. (2011). Water Erosion: Environmental and Economical Hazard. In: Gliński, J., Horabik, J., Lipiec, J. (eds) Encyclopedia of Agrophysics. Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-3585-1_183
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