Soil erosion measurement and soil conservation research in cultivated areas of the UK

Agricultural soil erosion by both water and wind is a local scale problem in the UK, particularly on the sandy and sandy loam soils under continuous cereal production or market gardening in the midland and eastern counties of England. Mean annual rates of soil erosion by water on these soils in fields on hillslopes up to 11° can exceed 2 kg/m2when rilling occurs, compared with a rate for top soil renewal of only about 0.1 kg/m2. Rates as high as 1.9 kg/m2have been recorded in individual storms and storm rates greater than 0.2 kg/m2can occur as frequently as in four years out of seven. Storm losses by wind erosion are of similar magnitude but those for gully erosion are much higher with rates reaching 15 to 19 kg/m2in single storms. Research into soil conservation has been carried out on Experimental Husbandry Farms and by farmers and commercial organizations with a direct interest in the problem. It has been largely limited to the use of shelterbelts, guard crops, soil stabilizers and land imprinting or pressing to control wind erosion with virtually no work having been undertaken on water erosion control. There is a need for more fundamental research which will allow the mechanics of the control measures to be understood better and to enable their general applicability to be assessed more readily. Research projects with these aims in mind are described involving investigations of the effects of crop cover on splash erosion, tillage effects on soil erodibility and the simple modelling of the erosion system to predict the stability or instability of the soil resource under given systems of agricultural management.