In dry lands of Iran, many wetlands and floodplains have dried up in recent years. So long as the wetlands had water, there was no dust or soil erosion in the area, because the soil was wet and there was vegetation cover around them. But now, there is severe wind erosion due to the fine texture of the soil as well as the soil salinity. Since these wetlands and floodplains may be dry for years, What do you recommend solutions or techniques to prevent wind erosion and dust storms in these areas?
Dear Nafees Mohammad
thank you for quick reply. in that areas, the soil is salty and no water
@ Mohammad, in that case you may go for
1. Vegetation cover with crop residues
2. Reduce cultivated fallow
3. Reduce or eliminate tillage
4. Maintain field shelterbelts with saline resistant plants
5.Use polysacchrides/polymer for soil binding, moisture retention and carbon build up
6. Avoid overgrazing
Dear Sir,
You can follow such practice to overcome from wind erosion issue
1. Minimum Tillage or minimum disturbance of soil so aggregate could be sustain til prolong time.
2. Cover the soil by mulching like vegetative mulch could be best
3. Overgrazing must be prohibited
4. Tree plantation
5. Shelterbelts and wind breaks
Dear J. C. Tarafdar and Hanuman Singh Jatav
as i mentioned above, these areas are very salty and vegetation can not grow. Hence, grazing does not occur because there is no vegetation
i think if there is some site nearby these dry wetlands with provision of water by any possible mean, development of forest stock will help in reducing wind intensity, this may reduce wind erosion in targeted areas
ِDear Muhammad Awais Rasool
this problem is related to bare dry wetlands areas which covered more than thousands hectare. you can see some photos in attach
Thx for the pictures. Is it possible to consider layering of pebbles on the ground? Please take it just an idea
Dear Mohammad Khosroshahi,
That is a serious challenge without large quantities of available water to restore the wetlands. To help us understand the problem more clearly do you have soil profile information (textures, salinity levels and organic matter content in the top 1 meter)? What is the depth to groundwater and is the groundwater also saline? What is the annual precipitation (quantity and monthly distribution)? Thank you, Brian
Dear Brian Wiebe
thank you very much for your reply. The average annual rainfall is 90.3 mm (41.04 mm in winter, 25.6 mm in spring, 1.3 mm in summer and 22.3 mm in autumn). Accordingly, the highest seasonal precipitation belongs to winter and 45.4% and the lowest is related to summer with 1.4%. The average temperature in winter is 4.99 degrees Celsius, spring is 23.4 degrees Celsius, summer is 34.5 degrees Celsius and 12.2 degrees Celsius. The average annual temperature in the study area is 19.03. C. The annual sum of evapo-transpiration is 3265 mm. Soils are saline and clay-saline . the depth of groundwater is about 2 m (it is varied in whole wetland) and is also saline.
if there are reed rod, and low vertical reed rod grids (1 m×1 m×0.2 m) are recommended.
A method to instantly stabilize the dust prone areas, and start the restoration of the native plants, is from the mosses up.
By mixing fertilizers with water, some organic matter (compost, aged manure, plant waste products, etc.) plus psyllium as a tackifier, you can start the process of the mosses growing and stabilizing the soil first. If you wanted to accelerate that process, you could add some crushed dried moss pieces to your slurry, as is described at
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/333835873_Hydroseeding_tackifiers_and_dryland_moss_restoration_potential_Tackifiers_vary_dryland_moss_growth
Also see article about propagation of desert mosses at https://plantmethods.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13007-021-00740-7
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