Exotic tree plantations in the Chilean Coastal Range: balancing the effects of discrete disturbances, connectivity, and a persistent drought on catchment erosion

The Chilean Coastal Range, located in the Mediterranean segment of Chile, is a soil-mantled landscape with the potential to store valuable freshwater supplies and support a biodiverse native forest. Nevertheless, human intervention has been increasing soil erosion for ∼ 200 years, culminating in the intense management of exotic tree plantations throughout the last ∼ 45 years. At the same time, this landscape has been severely affected by a prolonged megadrought. As a result, this combination of stressors complicates disentangling the effects of anthropogenic disturbances and hydroclimatic trends on sediment fluxes at the catchment scale. In this study, we calculate decennial catchment erosion rates from suspended-sediment loads and compare them with a millennial catchment denudation rate estimated from detrital 10Be. We then contrast both of these rates with the effects of discrete anthropogenic-disturbance events and hydroclimatic trends. Erosion and denudation rates are similar in magnitude on decennial and millennial timescales, i.e., 0.018 ± 0.005 and 0.024 ± 0.004 mm yr−1, respectively. Recent human-made disturbances include logging operations throughout all seasons and a dense network of forestry roads, thereby increasing structural sediment connectivity. Further disturbances include two widespread wildfires (2015 and 2017) and an earthquake with an Mw value of 8.8 in 2010. We observe decreased suspended-sediment loads during the wet seasons for the period 1986–2018, coinciding with declining streamflow, baseflow, and rainfall. The low millennial denudation rate aligns with a landscape dominated by slow diffusive soil creep. However, the low decennial erosion rate and the decrease in suspended sediment disagree with the expected effect of intense anthropogenic disturbances and increased structural (sediment) connectivity. Such a paradox suggests that suspended-sediment loads, and thus respective catchment erosion, are underestimated and that decennial sediment detachment and transport have been masked by decreasing rainfall and streamflow (i.e., weakened hydroclimatic drivers). Our findings indicate that human-made disturbances and hydrologic trends may result in opposite, partially offsetting effects on recent erosion, yet both contribute to landscape degradation.