The roots of the drought: Hydrology and water uptake strategies mediate forest-wide demographic response to precipitation

Articles

23 March 2018

An inter-disciplinary team at Bengaluru’s Indian Institute of Science (IISc) studied how different tree species partition underground water resources up to 30m depth and co-existing tree species diverge in water uptake depths (M-TROPICS/BVET). Deep rooted trees turn to be more vulnerable to severe droughts than shallow rooted species : climate change-type droughts could then affect the tree diversity.

The paper was published in Journal of Ecology and is available here.

More news

Reuse of bottom sediment from reservoirs to cropland is a promising agroecological practice that must be rationalized

In semi-arid areas, intermittent streams are often equipped with small reservoirs to store water for irrigation and/or groundwater recharge, and to capture sediments lost through erosion. These reservoirs must be periodically desilted to maintain their storage capacity. While bottom sediments are generally considered waste, their reuse in agricultural fields is a centuries-old practice in India. […]

Soil erosion control in tree plantations on steep slopes: Runoff water andsediment trapping efficiency of riparian grass buffer in mountainoushumid tropics

Riparian grass buffers reduce the velocity of water flowing over the soil surface during storms, capturing surface runoff (SR) and trapping soil particles eroded from cultivated slopes. Rarely quantified under steep slope conditions (>45 %), this phenomenon probably occurs in many mountain agroecosystems in the humid tropics. In Southeast Asia, teak plantations are often established on […]

Village settlements in mountainous tropical areas, hotspots of fecal contamination as evidenced by Escherichia coli and stanol concentrations in storm water pulses

Little is known about the contribution of villages to the fecal contamination of surface water in tropical rural areas. This study, published in the journal Environmental Science & Technology, documents E. coli and stanol concentration levels in surface runoff, and tracks the origin of the fecal contamination during flood events.

Search