A review of sediment fingerprinting for erosion hotspot assessment in southern Africa

Anthropogenic Land Use and Land Cover Change as Potential Drivers of Sediment Sources in the Upper Crocodile River, North West Province, South Africa

“…The lack of 137 Cs in both the surface and subsurface soil samples for all the land use types in the study catchment could be due to radioactive decay and low fallout in the Southern Hemisphere [ 67 ]. Other studies have equally reported on the absence or low activity concentration of 137 Cs in countries in the Southern Hemisphere, attributed to low activity fallout as compared to that in the Northern Hemisphere [ 68 ]. The findings of this study further corroborate those of Nde, Manjoro and Mathuthu [ 26 ], who reported the absence of 137 Cs in the North West Province of South Africa.…”

“…For example, a study by Collins, Zhang, McChesney, Walling, Haley and Smith [ 23 ] reported that, in an agricultural watershed in southern England, subsurface sources of sediment were second to non-metal surface farm tracks as the most important sources of sediments in the river. Similarly, Stander, Le Roux, Abd Elbasit and Liu [ 68 ] demonstrated that soil erodibility represents the dominant soil factor in South Africa. Additionally, one possible explanation for the high contribution of the subsurface soil could be the fact that most of the cultivated areas act as production zones of more sediment due to the constant tilling of surfaces with less vegetation cover to act as a soil buffer.…”

Commemorating three decades of the Southern African association of geomorphologists

“…For their contribution, Stander et al (2021) review fingerprinting techniques and applications to tracing sediment in southern Africa. They present an overview of the methodological sequence and recommend the application of sediment tracing at erosion hotspots and locations where duplex soils are expected to be highly erodible.…”