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Morphological diversity of plant barriers does not increase sediment retention in eroded marly gullies under ecological restoration

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Abstract

Aims

Sediment retention by plant barriers initiates common strategies to conserve soil fertility or restore degraded terrains, including gullied ones. Differences in species performance for sediment retention have been studied but little is known about plant performance in retention when upscaling to plurispecific barriers. We investigated the role of morphological diversity of plant barriers in sediment retention in the context of eroded marly gullies.

Methods

Fifteen plant barriers, composed of combinations of four morphologically contrasting species (grass, shrub, dwarf-shrub and juvenile tree) were tested for their sediment retention potential in an innovative life-size artificial concentrated runoff experiment. We studied the net effect of biodiversity and the role of morphological traits on sediment retention.

Results

We found that grass barriers performed best to retain sediment and morphological diversity significantly impaired sediment retention. This negative effect may be due to runoff concentrating in the least flow-resistant areas (shrubs or trees), resulting in a localized increase in flow velocity and thus an overall decrease in sediment deposition.

Conclusion

To initiate gully restoration by increasing sediment retention in their bed, morphologically homogeneous plant barriers should be favored. Plant diversity, useful for mid- and long-term restoration goals, should be considered later in the process.

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Abbreviations

SLA:

Specific Leaf Area

LDMC:

Leaf Dry Matter Content

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Acknowledgements

We thank Electricité de France (EDF), Agence de l’eau Rhône, Méditerranée et Corse, Région Provence-Alpes-Côte-d’Azur and European Union (FEDER program “L’Europe s’engage en PACA avec le Fonds Européen de Développement Régional”) for financial support. We also thank Fabien Candy for graphical assistance, Nicolle Mathys and Frédéric Liébault for their advises during the set-up of the experimentation, Mélanie Burylo and Joachim Rogeon for their help in the fieldwork and, finally, Thomas Cordonnier and Gregory Loucougaray for statistical help. Finally, we thank the two anonymous reviewers for their comments which helped improving the manuscript. This study was made possible by a research grant provided by the University of Grenoble.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Irstea, UR EMGR Ecosystèmes montagnards, 2 rue de la Papeterie-BP 76, Saint-Martin-d’Hères, 38402, France

    Amandine Erktan, Lauric Cécillon & Freddy Rey

  2. IRD, UMR Eco&Sols, BP 596, 34394, Montpellier cedex 5, France

    Eric Roose

  3. AgroParisTech, Laboratoire Ecologie, Systématique et Evolution, UMR 8079, CNRS, Université Paris Sud, AgroParisTech, 91405, Orsay cedex, France

    Nathalie Frascaria-Lacoste

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  1. Amandine Erktan
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  2. Lauric Cécillon
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  5. Freddy Rey
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Correspondence to Amandine Erktan.

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Erktan, A., Cécillon, L., Roose, E. et al. Morphological diversity of plant barriers does not increase sediment retention in eroded marly gullies under ecological restoration. Plant Soil 370, 653–669 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-013-1738-5

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