Information
Level 2 Detail of experimental conditions (what might be found in a journal paper or project brief in Hydstra)
Description of study
What?
The frequency of runoff in mulga country was investigated in terms of vegetation and topography in small plot studies.
When and Where?
The study was carried out between November 1972 and January 1974 on mulga zones in Queensland. Soils were infertile sandy loams 1 – 2 m deep.
How?
24 micro-catchments, each 2.5 m x 1.2 m were installed under tree densities ranging from 0 to 4000 trees ha-1. The frequency of occurrence was calculated for four classes of runoff ≤1mm, > 1 ≤ 5mm, > 5 ≤ 10 mm and > 10 mm, and recorded from five classes of rainfall: > 10 ≤ 15 mm, > 15 ≤ 30 mm, > 30 ≤ 50 mm, > 50 ≤ 100 mm and > 100 mm.
The threshold value of runoff was recorded for each catchment by applying water through a shower rose in a checker-board pattern over the catchment until water moved laterally across the surface in the collection bin. The quantity of water applied was called the threshold value.
Surface runoff was collected from 100 1m x 1m plots installed on soft mulga, hard mulga and dissected residual land zones. Water was applied through a shower rose at approximately 100 mm h-1. Terminal velocity was similar to natural rainfall at approximately 7.1 m s-1.
After the runoff was recorded various vegetation assessments were undertaken for each plot and the surface slope was recorded.
Project administration
Site identifier code: N/A
Principal investigator: Pressland AJ, Lehane KJ
Principal data manager: N/A
Principal organizations: Department of Primary Industries
Data custodian: Department of Primary Industries
Key co-operators: Australian Wool Corporation
Data access policy: Research has been published but base data is not archived
Planned pathway for data: completed study, no evidence of formal database records.
Data warehousing: for ongoing studies N/A
Planned data upload frequency: for ongoing studies N/A
Key references and sources of this data synthesis
These data summaries have been extracted from:
- Pressland AJ & Lehane KJ. (1982). Runoff and the ameliorating effect of plant cover in the mulga communities of south western Queensland. Aust. Rangel. J. 4(1): 16-20.