Relationship of weather types on the seasonal and spatial variability of rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield in the western Mediterranean basin

Rainfall is the key factor to understand soil erosion processes, mechanisms, and rates. Most research was conducted to determine rainfall characteristics and their relationship with soil erosion (erosivity) but there is little information about how atmospheric patterns control soil losses, and this is important to enable sustainable environmental planning and risk prevention. We investigated the temporal and spatial variability of the relationships of rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield with atmospheric patterns (weather types, WTs) in the western Mediterranean basin. For this purpose, we analyzed a large database of rainfall events collected between 1985 and 2015 in 46 experimental plots and catchments with the aim to: (i) evaluate seasonal differences in the contribution of rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield produced by the WTs; and (ii) to analyze the seasonal efficiency of the different WTs (relation frequency and magnitude) related to rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield. The results indicate two different temporal patterns: the first weather type exhibits (during the cold period: autumn and winter) westerly flows that produce the highest rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield values throughout the territory; the second weather type exhibits easterly flows that predominate during the warm period (spring and summer) and it is located on the Mediterranean coast of the Iberian Peninsula. However, the cyclonic situations present high frequency throughout the whole year with a large influence extended around the western Mediterranean basin. Contrary, the anticyclonic situations, despite of its high frequency, do not contribute significantly to the total rainfall, runoff, and sediment (showing the lowest efficiency) because of atmospheric stability that currently characterize this atmospheric pattern. Our approach helps to better understand the relationship of WTs on the seasonal and spatial variability of rainfall, runoff and sediment yield with a regional scale based on the large dataset and number of soil erosion experimental stations

Relationship of Weather Types on the Seasonal and Spatial Variability of Rainfall, Runoff, and Sediment Yield in the Western Mediterranean Basin

Rainfall is the key factor to understand soil erosion processes, mechanisms, and rates. Most research was conducted to determine rainfall characteristics and their relationship with soil erosion (erosivity) but there is little information about how atmospheric patterns control soil losses, and this is important to enable sustainable environmental planning and risk prevention. We investigated the temporal and spatial variability of the relationships of rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield with atmospheric patterns (weather types, WTs) in the western Mediterranean basin. For this purpose, we analyzed a large database of rainfall events collected between 1985 and 2015 in 46 experimental plots and catchments with the aim to: (i) evaluate seasonal differences in the contribution of rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield produced by the WTs; and (ii) to analyze the seasonal efficiency of the different WTs (relation frequency and magnitude) related to rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield. The results indicate two different temporal patterns: the first weather type exhibits (during the cold period: autumn and winter) westerly flows that produce the highest rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield values throughout the territory; the second weather type exhibits easterly flows that predominate during the warm period (spring and summer) and it is located on the Mediterranean coast of the Iberian Peninsula. However, the cyclonic situations present high frequency throughout the whole year with a large influence extended around the western Mediterranean basin. Contrary, the anticyclonic situations, despite of its high frequency, do not contribute significantly to the total rainfall, runoff, and sediment (showing the lowest efficiency) because of atmospheric stability that currently characterize this atmospheric pattern. Our approach helps to better understand the relationship of WTs on the seasonal and spatial variability of rainfall, runoff and sediment yield with a regional scale based on the large dataset and number of soil erosion experimental stations.Spanish Government (Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, MINECO) and FEDER Projects: CGL2014 52135-C3-3-R, ESP2017-89463-C3-3-R, CGL2014-59946-R, CGL2015-65569-R, CGL2015-64284-C2-2-R, CGL2015-64284-C2-1-R, CGL2016-78075-P, GL2008-02879/BTE, LEDDRA 243857, RECARE-FP7, CGL2017-83866-C3-1-R, and PCIN-2017-061/AEI. Dhais Peña-Angulo received a “Juan de la Cierva” postdoctoral contract (FJCI-2017-33652 Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, MEC). Ana Lucia acknowledge the "Brigitte-Schlieben-Lange-Programm". The “Geoenvironmental Processes and Global Change” (E02_17R) was financed by the Aragón Government and the European Social Fund. José Andrés López-Tarazón acknowledges the Secretariat for Universities and Research of the Department of the Economy and Knowledge of the Autonomous Government of Catalonia for supporting the Consolidated Research Group 2014 SGR 645 (RIUS- Fluvial Dynamics Research Group). Artemi Cerdà thank the funding of the OCDE TAD/CRP JA00088807. José Martínez-Fernandez acknowledges the project Unidad de Excelencia CLU-2018-04 co-funded by FEDER and Castilla y León Government. Ane Zabaleta is supported by the Hydro-Environmental Processes consolidated research group (IT1029-16, Basque Government). This paper has the benefit of the Lab and Field Data Pool created within the framework of the COST action CONNECTEUR (ES1306)

Sostenibilidad de los cultivos subtropicales: claves para el manejo del suelo, el uso agrícola y la Ordenación del Territorio

Soil management is a key issue for the correct conservation of the land, which allows us to guarantee the care of the environment and guarantee the food security of the population. However, unsustainable management due to the use of herbicides, tillage and intensification of plantations are difficulting this task. On the southern coast of the Iberian Peninsula, in the provinces of Mal-aga, Granada and Almería, the introduction of subtropical crops as a replacement for other tra-ditional species (olive groves, grapevines and almonds) is generating a destabilization of the soil, to date little studied. Therefore, the main goal of this research is to carry out an exhaustive study of soil conditions using soil profiles and descriptions together with soil analysis, considering an experimental plot in the Guadalhorce Valley (Malaga) as the study area with avocado, mango and mandarin crops. The results show how the degradation of the soil profile in all its horizons and properties after unsustainable management is intense. This will affect the quality of production and productivity. Therefore, degradation control measures are necessary, not only at the parcel level, but also at the regional level so that this problem does not spread to a larger scale in the territory

Correction to: Long-term changes in rainfed olive production, rainfall and farmer’s income in Bailén (Jaén, Spain) (Euro-Mediterranean Journal for Environmental Integration, (2021), 6, 2, (58), 10.1007/s41207-021-00268-1)

The article Long‑term changes in rainfed olive production, rainfall and farmer’s income in Bailén (Jaén, Spain), written by Jesús Rodrigo‑Comino, José María Senciales‑Gonzalez, Yang Yu, Luca Salvati, Antonio Gimenez‑Morera and Artemi Cerdà, was originally published electronically on the publisher’s internet portal on 18 June 2021 without open access. With the author(s)’ decision to opt for Open Choice the copyright of the article changed on 3 July 2021 to © The Author(s) 2021 and the article is forthwith distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http:// creat iveco mmons. org/ licen ses/ by/4.0. The original article has been corrected

Long-term changes in rainfed olive production, rainfall and farmer’s income in Bailén (Jaén, Spain)

Economic, social, and climatic conditions affect agricultural production. Those changes are relevant to the rainfed agricultural areas of the Mediterranean Belt, including Spain—the largest producer of olive oil in the world. However, little is known about the effect of the climate on olive production and farmer income. In this study, the correlation between changes in rainfall and total olive production was examined using a long-term dataset (28 years) on conventional rainfed production and tillage soil management. The dataset focused on different olive groves in the municipality of Bailén (Jaén, Andalusia) that have been owned by the same farmer since 1966. The province of Jaén is the region of Spain with the highest production of olive oil and the largest area of olive groves. The data included annual rainfall, production per plot and the price of olives. After calculating missing data to complete the rainfall series, pairwise correlation analysis with nonparametric Spearman's rank coefficients and principal component analysis were used to process the data. The results showed that higher production coincided with increased rainfall during August and December. Therefore, we concluded that the impact of rainfall on olive production is variable and depends on drought intensity and the monthly rainfall distribution. An economic study showed that farmer income was highly dependent on the seasonal distribution of the rainfall among other factors such as the price of olives. Farmer income was low during drought periods, indicating that rainfed agriculture is perceived by farmers as unsustainable due to the resulting highly variable income. This study could help to prevent risks to food security in the future. We recognise that other key factors have also been important influences on the fluctuations in olive production over the years, such as soil properties and plant status. However, cultivating olives without irrigation—depending only on the total rainfall amount and rainfall intensity to supply all of the water consumed by the plants—is very risky too. This research demonstrates that the subsistence of Mediterranean rainfed olive farmers can be highly dependent on the rainfall conditions

Spatial variability of the relationships of runoff and sediment yield with weather types throughout the Mediterranean basin

Soil degradation by water is a serious environmental problem worldwide, with specific climatic factors being the major causes. We investigated the relationships between synoptic atmospheric patterns (i.e. weather types, WI's) and runoff, erosion and sediment yield throughout the Mediterranean basin by analyzing a large database of natural rainfall events at 68 research sites in 9 countries. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used to identify spatial relationships of the different WTs including three hydro-sedimentary variables: rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield (SY, used to refer to both soil erosion measured at plot scale and sediment yield registered at catchment scale). The results indicated 4 spatial classes of rainfall and runoff: (a) northern sites dependent on North (N) and North West (NW) flows; (b) eastern sites dependent on E and NE flows; (c) southern sites dependent on S and SE flows; and, finally, (d) western sites dependent on W and SW flows. Conversely, three spatial classes are identified for SY characterized by: (a) N and NE flows in northern sites (b) E flows in eastern sites, and (c) W and SW flows in western sites. Most of the rainfall, runoff and SY occurred during a small number of daily events, and just a few WTs accounted for large percentages of the total. Our results confirm that characterization by WT improves understanding of the general conditions under which runoff and SY occur, and provides useful information for understanding the spatial variability of runoff, and SY throughout the Mediterranean basin. The approach used here could be useful to aid of the design of regional water management and soil conservation measures

Spatial variability of the relationships of runoff and sediment yield with weather types throughout the Mediterranean basin

Soil degradation by water is a serious environmental problem worldwide, with specific climatic factors being the major causes. We investigated the relationships between synoptic atmospheric patterns (i.e. weather types, WTs) and runoff, erosion and sediment yield throughout the Mediterranean basin by analyzing a large database of natural rainfall events at 68 research sites in 9 countries. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used to identify spatial relationships of the different WTs including three hydro-sedimentary variables: rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield (SY, used to refer to both soil erosion measured at plot scale and sediment yield registered at catchment scale). The results indicated 4 spatial classes of rainfall and runoff: (a) northern sites dependent on North (N) and North West (NW) flows; (b) eastern sites dependent on E and NE flows; (c) southern sites dependent on S and SE flows; and, finally, (d) western sites dependent on W and SW flows. Conversely, three spatial classes are identified for SY characterized by: (a) N and NE flows in northern sites (b) E flows in eastern sites, and (c) W and SW flows in western sites. Most of the rainfall, runoff and SY occurred during a small number of daily events, and just a few WTs accounted for large percentages of the total. Our results confirm that characterization by WT improves understanding of the general conditions under which runoff and SY occur, and provides useful information for understanding the spatial variability of runoff, and SY throughout the Mediterranean basin. The approach used here could be useful to aid of the design of regional water management and soil conservation measures