Excerpt from Mulches for Wind and Water Erosion Control

This report deals with procedures for establishing various kinds of protective mulch and for establishing and maintaining permanent vegetation. The word mulch means any substance, such as straw, hay, paper, gravel, organic or inorganic film, brush Spread upon the ground, or produced and killed or allowed to die and left on the ground as a stubble mulch, or formed and left on the ground as a layer of clods or dust, for the purpose of protecting the soil from erosion or the plants from heat, cold, or drought. The limitation on what is called a mulch is not the kind of material from which it is derived but that it be dead when left or placed on the ground. On the other hand, the term permanent vegetation means perennial vegetation such as grasses, shrubs, or trees growing on the land. Perma nent vegetation is a living cover, whereas mulch is a dead cover. A mulch may be tempo rary such as dead vegetation, or permanent such as a layer of stones or gravel.

This report includes information on stabilization of level and sloping ground, but not waterways The information was obtained in part from a series of experiments started in 1959 on contract with the Bureau of Yards and Docks, Department of the Navy. Explanations of various research procedures and data pertaining to the contracted series of experiments are contained in other reports 9, A portable wind tunnel was used to determine the effectiveness of the various mulching treatments under field conditions (fig. Limited information also was obtained on the relative effectiveness of some of the treatments against erosion by water. From results of the wind tunnel tests, the wind erosion climatic factor (4) and the universal wind erosion equation (1) were used to estimate the relative quantities of mulch required in various sections of the United States. An effective wind erosion control treatment is considered as one that will resist an 85-mile-per-hour wind as measured at so-foot height.

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