Wind Erosion in Western Queensland Australia

Chapter 7 – Land Erodibility Dynamics 1980-20067.7 ConclusionsThis research has examined spatial and temporal patterns in land erodibility in westernQueensland, Australia. The distribution of erodible land areas has been mapped, and temporalchanges in land erodibility have been analysed in the context of regional and global scaleclimate variability. Consistently erodible land areas were found to be located in dunefieldsand the outer floodplains of the regions’ major river systems. These spatial patterns in landerodibility are consistent with observational records of wind erosion activity. Temporal trendsin land erodibility were found to be distinct across the four study area bioregions. Regionalscale land erodibility dynamics were found to be influenced by vegetation cover sensitivity torainfall, ENSO and PDO interactions. In a global context the research has highlighted thecomplex and dynamic nature of land erodibility.Model predictions of climate change indicate increasing variability in precipitation across theworld’s deserts (Meehl et al., 2007). Concurrently, global measurements of outgoing longwaveradiation indicate a poleward expansion of the Hadley circulation (Hu and Fu, 2007).These may lead to increased frequencies of drought and the expansion of mid-latitude desertsin the northern and southern hemispheres. The results presented in this chapter demonstratethat regional scale changes in land erodibility are sensitive to rainfall variability driven byglobal scale climate teleconnections. This emphasises the importance of research to map andmonitor land erodibility so that we can better understand the effects of land management andfuture climatic changes on wind erosion processes.Further research into land erodibility dynamics in Australia requires an extension of thatpresented here. Firstly, research should focus on extending the length of the modelsimulations. This would allow variations in land erodibility to be analysed under a greaterrange of ENSO and PDO conditions. Secondly, effort should be directed toward developingschemes to simulate temporal changes in soil erodibility in rangeland environments. Landerodibility dynamics over small (sub-regional) spatial and monthly temporal scales are highlydependent on soil erodibility, particularly in landscapes with sparse vegetation cover. Theaddition of a robust soil erodibility scheme to AUSLEM would improve model skill inassessing land erodibility. It would also allow for analyses of model output at higher temporalresolutions and an ability to assess the impacts of short- and long-term land managementpractices on potential wind erosion activity. Finally, analyses should be extended to include187