An Investigation for Methodological Framework to select Grass Roots for Controlling Rill and gully Erosion in Lateritic Area in West Bengal, India

Abstract

Traditional vegetation techniques to control rill-gully erosion rely mainly on the effects of above ground biomass; whereas little attention has been given to the role of below ground biomass i.e. ischolar_mains system. Yet, in a context where above ground biomass may temporally or specially disappear (e.g. due to temperature or over grazing), ischolar_mains can play an important role in soil erosion rates. This paper presents a methodology to assess the suitability of grass ischolar_mains for rill-gully erosion control and its application to 8 grass species, representative for a semi-arid lateritic rolling environment in western part of West Bengal, India. In this analysis determination of suitable grass species for controlling concentrated flow erosion is based on a multi-criteria analysis. First, two main criteria are determined, i.e. (i) the high potential of grass ischolar_mains to prevent incision by concentrated flow erosion, (ii) the potential of resist to bending by water flow. Then an indicator was used to assess the scores for the two criteria. In total three indicators are selected, i.e. RD, RLD, and RAR. The scores for the indicators are represented on triangulation diagrams. Among the experimental grass species, Eragrostis cynosuroides grass ischolar_mains are found to be more suitable than other species for rill-gully erosion control in lateritic badland topography.