Drought, Wind, and Blowing Dust on the Southern High Plains of the United States

Lee, Jeffrey A.; Wigner, Kenneth A.; Gregory, James M.

doi:10.1080/02723646.1993.10642467

Cited by 33 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…(e.g., Belnap and Gillette, 1997;Gillette et al, 1980;Nash et al, 2003). Although Tegen et al (2004) suggest that agricultural land use is responsible for less than 10% of global dust loads, recent studies demonstrate large increases in dust flux due to historic land use on a regional scale (Lee et al, 1993;Neff et al, 2008;Reynolds et al, 2009b). Belnap et al (2009) showed that dust emissions in the Needles area of Canyonlands are strongly linked to previous land use, which has affected the vegetation structure and biological crust cover.…”

Section: Effects Of Dust Source and Land Usementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Land use policies may exacerbate the effects of projected future warming. Sediment cores recovered from alpine lakes downwind of southwestern drylands show strong evidence for large increases in dust flux during the past $150 years due to land use impacts, especially grazing and industrialization (Reynolds et al, 2009b), and other studies document similar effects (Belnap et al, 2009;Lee et al, 1993;Schlesinger et al, 1990). Thus, it is increasingly important to understand the conditions that influence dust emissions in the southwest in order to forecast future emissions and to provide input to land management decisions that mitigate or exacerbate emissions.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The PDI incorporates temperature and rainfall data, and is frequently used in dust emission studies (e.g., Lee et al, 1993;Mahowald et al, 2007;Reynolds et al, 2009a). PDI values may obscure weather differences between the two study areas because the values are normalized to local long-term averages.…”

Section: Climate Datamentioning

confidence: 99%

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Regional and climatic controls on seasonal dust deposition in the southwestern U.S.

Reheis

Urban

2011

Aeolian Research

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a b s t r a c tVertical dust deposition rates (dust flux) are a complex response to the interaction of seasonal precipitation, wind, changes in plant cover and land use, dust source type, and local vs. distant dust emission in the southwestern U.S. Seasonal dust flux in the Mojave-southern Great Basin (MSGB) deserts, measured from 1999 to 2008, is similar in summer-fall and winter-spring, and antecedent precipitation tends to suppress dust flux in winter-spring. In contrast, dust flux in the eastern Colorado Plateau (ECP) region is much larger in summer-fall than in winter-spring, and twice as large as in the MSGB. ECP dust is related to wind speed, and in the winter-spring to antecedent moisture. Higher summer dust flux in the ECP is likely due to gustier winds and runoff during monsoonal storms when temperature is also higher. Source types in the MSGB and land use in the ECP have important effects on seasonal dust flux. In the MSGB, wet playas produce salt-rich dust during wetter seasons, whereas antecedent and current moisture suppress dust emission from alluvial and dry-playa sources during winter-spring. In the ECP under drought conditions, dust flux at a grazed-and-plowed site increased greatly, and also increased at three annualized, previously grazed sites. Dust fluxes remained relatively consistent at ungrazed and currently grazed sites that have maintained perennial vegetation cover. Under predicted scenarios of future climate change, these results suggest that an increase in summer storms may increase dust flux in both areas, but resultant effects will depend on source type, land use, and vegetation cover.Published by Elsevier B.V.

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Section: Effects Of Dust Source and Land Usementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Regional and climatic controls on seasonal dust deposition in the southwestern U.S.

Reheis

Urban

2011

Aeolian Research

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“…Partitioning dust emissions from either natural or anthropogenic sources is extremely difficult in a region of mixed land uses, such as south eastern Australia. Climate drives large geomorphic dust sources, such as the Lake Eyre floodplains [38,53], along with incremental changes in ground cover associated with season or drought [29,[33][34][35]. Whilst remote sensing techniques, such as TOMS and MODIS, can provide valuable data regarding aerosol loading [20,27] and even locate small dust source areas [38], they cannot reliably inform us about the anthropogenic nature of the dust, particularly in the rangelands.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The later part of the record 1915 to 2015 was based on meteorological records. Lee, et al [29] report the 42-year record (1947 to 1989) for Lubbock, Texas. They report that wind and drought indexes are poor predictors of dust activity due to the impact of agricultural land management practices.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Where She Blows! A Ten Year Dust Climatology of Western New South Wales Australia

Leys¹,

Strong

Heidenreich³

et al. 2018

Geosciences

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Dust emissions contribute significantly to atmospheric processes impacting the functioning of various earth and human systems. The question is often asked "how much dust is acceptable?" From a land management perspective, the aim is to reduce the degradation effects of wind erosion over time.To do this, we need to know the range of dust activity over a long time period and to set a target that shows a reduction in dust activity. In this study, dust activity is described by the number of dust hours per July to June period (dust storm year, DSY). We used the DustWatch network of high resolution particulate matter less than 10 µm (PM10) instruments to characterise the dust climatology for a ten year period for western New South Wales (NSW), Australia. The ten year study period covered one of the driest and wettest periods in south-eastern Australia, providing confidence that we have measurements of extremes of dust (0 to 412 h/DSY), rainfall (98 to 967 mm/DSY), and ground cover (0 to 99% of area/DSY). The dust data are then compared to remotely sensed ground cover and measured rainfall data to develop targets across a rainfall gradient. Quantile regression was used to estimate the number of dust hours for a given DSY rainfall at 21 DustWatch Nodes (DWN). The 75th percentile is used to determine the target number of dust hours for a ten year average DSY. The monitoring network clearly identified locations of high dust activity and changes in dust and ground cover that are associated with rainfall. The dust hour targets for NSW indicated that for every 100 mm increase in DSY rainfall (between 250 and 650 mm) there is a 10 h decrease in dust hours. The dust target enables us to evaluate whether wind erosion is decreasing with time for sites with different rainfall.

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Characteristics of aeolian grain transport over a fluvio-glacial lacustrine braid delta, Lake Tekapo, New Zealand

McGowan

Sturman

1997

Earth Surf. Process. Landforms

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This paper presents results from one of the few scientific studies to examine the physical characteristics of aeolian sediment transport in an alpine area, where topographically reinforced foehn winds initiate dust storm events. The major objective of this study is to improve knowledge of aeolian processes in mid-latitude alpine regions experiencing extreme wind speeds. Of particular interest is the role of surface characteristics in contributing to the unusually deep saltation layer which is seen to form over fluvio-glacial deposits in the Southern Alps of New Zealand. Sediment was collected at several heights (0·5, 1, 2 and 4 m) and locations over a large alpine braided river delta, and standard laboratory techniques used to examine grain size characteristics. An image processing technique was also used to evaluate grain roundness.Grains filtered from the airstream at 0·5 m and 1m above such surfaces were found to display a mean grain size of approximately 300 to 435 µm, resembling grain size characteristics of saltation clouds previously observed in high latitude, cold climate locations, in contrast to desert and prairie environments. Samples collected at 2 and 4 m above the surface were found to consist of 60 to 65 per cent sand-sized material, with some grains exceeding 1-1·5 mm in diameter. Grain shape analysis conducted on silt-and clay-sized grains filtered from the airstream above mixed sand and gravel surfaces showed such grains to display an increase in grain roundness with height. This characteristic is thought to reflect the airstream's shape-sorting ability and has important implications with respect to the often observed increase in grain roundness in aeolian deposits with increasing distance from source areas. Namely, if more rounded grains are preferentially carried higher into the airstream and therefore into regions of higher wind speed, they should theoretically be transported further from the entrainment zone before being deposited.The high wind speeds observed, often exceeding 30 m s −1 , are seen to transport significantly larger sediment than reported in the literature for desert and prairie environments. In addition, the mixture of grain sizes, and especially the pebble-and cobble-sized clasts that dominate the fluvio-glacial deposits associated with the braided rivers in this mountain region, also appear to increase significantly the trajectory height of saltating sand grains. As a result of these two factors, the depth of the saltation cloud often exceeds 1m.Observations made in this study therefore highlight the need for field and laboratory aeolian process studies to be extended to examine grain transport over coarse-grained beds during much higher wind velocities than typically reported in the literature. Such studies would provide a valuable insight into aeolian processes in high latitude/altitude environments, such as loess genesis.

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Drought, Wind, and Blowing Dust on the Southern High Plains of the United States

Cited by 33 publications

References 20 publications

Regional and climatic controls on seasonal dust deposition in the southwestern U.S.

Regional and climatic controls on seasonal dust deposition in the southwestern U.S.

Where She Blows! A Ten Year Dust Climatology of Western New South Wales Australia

Characteristics of aeolian grain transport over a fluvio-glacial lacustrine braid delta, Lake Tekapo, New Zealand

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