Efficient organic mulch thickness for soil and water conservation in urban areas.

Wang, Bing; Niu, Jianzhi; Berndtsson, Ronny; Zhang, Linus; Chen, Xiongwen; Li, Xiang; Zhu, Zhijun

The use of organic mulch is important for urban green applications. For urban areas in arid and semiarid regions receiving short high-intensive rainfall, rainfall characteristics, and soil slope play an important role for mulch functioning. These properties of mulch were studied. For this purpose, rainfall simulation experiments using organic mulching were conducted in Jiufeng National Forestry Park to analyze the influence of organic mulch under different slope and heavy rainfall events. The results showed that soil water content displayed a decreasing tendency with increasing mulch application. Compared to bare soil, a mulch application of 0.25 kg/m2 and 0.50 kg/m2 led to maximum soil water content and maximum runoff decrease occurred for 0.50 kg/m2 mulch. Higher application rate of mulch displayed less soil water content and greater runoff. The runoff amount and runoff generation rate decreased by 28-83% and 21-83%, respectively, as compared to bare soil. With a mulch application of 0.25-1.00 kg/m2, soil drainage accounted for 56-60% of total rainfall. Overall, an efficient mulch application was found to be 0.25-0.50 kg/m2. The results of this study are relevant for arid and semiarid urban regions that experience heavy rainfall.