1165 | Advances in the study of badlands and gully systems | Mariano Moreno De Las Heras (1); Milica Kasanin-Grubin (2); Ona Torra Truncal (3); Estela Nadal Romero (4); Francesc Gallart (5)
Badlands are highly dissected areas, comprising hillslopes and divides carved in soft bedrock and unconsolidated sediments, with little or no vegetation, that are useless for agriculture. These stunning landscapes of extremely rugged terrain with intense present or past geomorphological activity can occur all over the World under a broad variety of climate conditions, including arid, semi-arid and both sub-humid and humid conditions. Badlands differ from gully systems in the sense that the former include both hillslopes and divides, whereas gullies represent essentially linear erosive forms. However, gully systems can be closely related to badlands, as gully development may start or reactivate badland dynamics.
Badland and gully systems typically represent minor sections of the terrain, but are commonly perceived as hotspots of sediment production at large regional scales, impacting downstream freshwater ecosystems and the security of water reservoirs, and also playing a key role for organizing the sedimentary structure of rivers and maintaining river deltas. Furthermore, these erosive landforms are natural laboratories that allow the study of many different pedological, biological and geomorphic processes, with both on-site and off-site implications of water and soil management. The study of badland and gully systems has, therefore, important implications for both land and basin management, particularly in the present context of Climate Change, where precipitation concentration in more extreme rainfall events may result in increased soil erosion and mobilisation of sediments to river channels and reservoirs.
This EUGEO 2023 badland and gully session is co-sponsored by the Badlands Working Group of the International Association of Geomorphologists. We welcome theoretical, modelling and empirical studies, including (i) the detection and mapping of badland and gully systems applying GIS data analysis and the use of remote sensing resources, (ii) the study of bedrock weathering and denudation activity and other associated geomorphological processes acting in these erosive landforms (e.g., mass wasting, gullying, rilling, piping) using sparse observations (e.g. pins, profiles and volumetric methods) and high-resolution surveying (e.g., TLS/LiDAR and Structure from Motion techniques), (iii) the relationships between physical (hydrological and erosive) processes and biological activity, (iv) the study of sediment dynamics of badland and gully systems at the plot, catchment and basin scales, as well as (v) process-based exploration of the origin of these erosive landforms and their evolution in the present context of Global Change. If the EUGEO organization finds it feasible, the people involved in the organization of this session may also organize a supplementary one-day post-conference field trip for the participants of the conference to visit a set of research badland/gully sites near Barcelona (i.e., the Upper Llobregat basin and the Vallcebre experimental catchments).
Mariano Moreno De Las Heras (1); Milica Kasanin-Grubin (2); Ona Torra Truncal (3); Estela Nadal Romero (4); Francesc Gallart (5)
(1) University of Barcelona, Department of Geography, Barcelona, Spain, (2) University of Belgrade, Institute of Chemistry, Technology and Metalurgy, Centre of Chemistry, Belgrade, Serbia, (3) BarcelonaTECH Polytechnic University of Catalonia, Geotechnical Engineering and Geosciences, Barcelona, Spain, (4) Pyrenean Institute of Ecology (IPE), Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), Zaragoza, Spain, (5) Institute of Environmental Assessment and Water Research (IDAEA), Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), Barcelona, Spain
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