Does the Amount of Vegetation Cover Affect How Fast Water Infiltrates Into the Ground?

Does the amount of vegetation cover affect how fast water infiltrates into the ground?

The scatter graph above has a clear positive correlation. This means that as the percentage of bare ground goes up so does the rate at which water soaks or infiltrates into the ground. Point 1 on the graph shows that with a full coverage of plant cover the water soaks (or infiltrates) into the ground very slowly, only 5 ml of water enters per second. In contrast, point 2 shows that with 100% bare ground (0% plant coverage) water soaks into the ground incredibly quickly, with 32ml of water entering the soil every second. This is a difference of 27ml of water per second, a considerable difference.

The reason for this is that plants and their roots give the soil more substance and trap water as it sinks into the soil profile. The plants also add vegetative matter to the soil. This slows the entry of water into the soil and is the reason for water entering slowly at point 1. In areas were there was no plant matter, normally the front of the dune system at Seaton Sluice, we found only bare sand. Water moved very quickly between these loose particles and hence gave rapid infiltration rates.

Point 3 on the graph is an anomaly as it had the second most rapid infiltration rate despite having 100% coverage of plants. However, when I looked back at the data sheets I could see that we noted that we could not get the Infiltration meter into the soil because it was too hard, and the water leaked out of the sides of the infiltration meter rather than have time to soak into the soil. This is the reason for this result.

Overall I can conclude that the more plant cover there is, the slower the water enters the soil at Seaton Sluice sand dunes, as predicted in the introduction.