Geology Reference
In-Depth Information
WEPP has important capabilities in evaluating
various scenarios for small watersheds. The abil-
ity to determine where and when erosion occurs
in such a small watershed can be important in
targeting treatment. The ability to study rare
storms (Mutel, 2010) to select special measures
to control runoff and sediment yield from them
can be important in preventing damages on and
off site, and can also be important for protecting
public investment in roads, bridges and other
structures, and in protecting human life.
In this case, WEPP was used to evaluate treat-
ments on farmed agricultural areas to determine
not only what benefits might be expected on this
watershed, but also what benefits might be
expected on tilled watersheds that occur in the
western half of the Osage river watershed.
WEPP seemed to be well suited for this type of
project. While it was not used on the forested
watershed and the soils on the eastern half of the
Osage river watershed, it could have been. WEPP
is well supported by soils, climate and manage-
ment databases for the US, and is applied to nearly
all areas and all erosion and sediment yield prob-
lems in the US. It is supported by tools that can
be applied to develop climate files to model cli-
mate change, and these were applied here.
WEPP has a number of different default man-
agements and default field operations databases.
The necessary tools to allow WEPP to be used in
other countries can easily be developed. Details
of field operations in a country can be added to
the databases and management files and saved for
later use within or outside that country. Plants
can be parameterized easily to match plant char-
acteristics in another country, or even new plants
that are not in the original database. WEPP has
tools that can be used to apply it to most of the
world, including the development of the neces-
sary local climate databases.
Edwards, W.M. & Owens, L.B. (1991) Large storm effects
on total soil erosion.
Journal of Soil and Water
Conservation
46
: 75-8.
Foster, G.R. & Lane, L.J. (1987)
User Requirements:
USDA-Water Erosion Prediction Project (WEPP)
.
NSERL Report No. 1, USDA-ARS National Soil Erosion
Research Laboratory, West Lafayette, IN: 43 pp.
Ghidey, F. & Alberts, E.E. (1996) Comparison of
measured and WEPP predicted runoff and soil loss
for Midwest claypan soil.
Transactions of the
American Society of Agricultural Engineers
39
:
1395-1402.
Haan, C.T. (1977)
Statistical Methods in Hydrology
.
Iowa State University Press, Ames, IA.
Iowa NRCS (2004) Iowa Technical Note 25. Iowa
Phosphorus Index. Available at http://www.ia.nrcs.
usda.gov/technical/Phosphorus/phosphorusstandard.
html
Laflen, J.M., Flanagan, D.C. & Engel, B.A. (2004) Soil
erosion and sediment yield prediction accuracy using
WEPP.
Journal of the American Water Resources
Association
40
: 289-97.
Mutel, C.F. (ed.) (2010)
A Watershed Year: Anatomy of
the Iowa floods of 2008
. University of Iowa Press,
Iowa City.
Nearing, M.A., Jetten, V., Baffaut, C.,
et al
. (2005)
Modeling response of soil erosion and runoff to changes
in precipitation and cover.
Catena
61
: 131-54.
Renard, K.G., Foster, G.R., Weesies, G.A.,
et al
. (1997)
Predicting Soil Erosion by Water - a guide to conser-
vation planning with the Revised Universal Soil Loss
Equation (RUSLE)
. USDA Agricultural Handbook
No. 703.
Renschler, C.S., Flanagan, D.C., Engel, B.A. &
Frankenberger, J.R. (2002)
GeoWEPP - the geo-spatial
interface for the Water Erosion Prediction Project
.
American Society of Agricultural Engineers Meeting,
Paper No. 022171. Available from ASAE, St. Joseph
MI, USA.
Smith, S.B., Mezzacappa, D.J., Gaddy, A. & Laflen, J.M.
(2002)
Evaluating landfill final cover soil loss (USLE,
RUSLE, and WEPP)
. SWANA 39
th
Annual Conference,
Baltimore, MD.
Southwest Watershed Research Center (2008) WEPP
CAT - Water Erosion Prediction Project Climate
Assessment Tool. Available at http://typhoon.tucson.
ars.ag.gov/weppcat/index.php
UMRSHNC (2005) Final Report: Gulf hypoxia and local
water quality concerns workshop. Upper Mississippi
River Sub-basin Hypoxia Nutrient Committee,
Ames, IA, September 2005. Available from American
References
Cruse, R., Flanagan, D., Frankenberger, J.,
et al
. (2006)
Daily estimates of rainfall, water runoff, and soil ero-
sion in Iowa.
Journal of Soil and Water Conservation
61
: 191-9.
