Abstract

Soil erosion can cost the world billions of dollars every year by washing pollutants into our streams and
rivers and by causing the loss of farmland. What can you do about this problem? Help save the world
(and some money!) with nothing more than a few plants!

Objective
Find out if plants can reduce the amount of soil that is eroded from a hill due to rainfall.

Soil erosion is the process of wind or water carrying soil away. This happens naturally, but humans
are speeding the process up, upsetting the balance in our ecosystems. Today, we're going to look at
how the presence of plants affects soil erosion. Before you get started, predict what will happen. Will
the plants increase or decrease soil erosion and why?

Soil Erosion Experiment

This might look like such a simple experiment but it will definitely show the importance of having
vegetation covering the soil to your kids! They will love this hands on experiment!

What you’ll need:

 6 empty coke bottles

 1 x piece of ply wood (30cm x 30cm x 2cm thick)

 Wood glue

 Scissors and Stanley knife

 String

 Soil from the garden and compost

 4 Seedlings

 Mulch (bark chips, dead leaves and sticks)

 Water

Step 1

Prepare three of the coke bottles by cutting a rectangular hole roughly 7cm x 25cm along the side of the
bottle.

(You can use a permanent marker to mark out the piece you want to cut out.)

Step 2

Stick the bottles to the wood with the wood glue making sure that the necks of the three bottles
protrude a little over the edge of the board.
Fill the first bottle with plain garden soil and the other two with a soil and compost mixture. Press down
firmly to compact it.
Step 3

Leave the first bottle as is.

Cover the top of the soil in the second bottle with your mulch (bark chips, dead leaves and sticks etc).

Plant your seedlings in the third bottle. Make sure you plant them tightly together and press down firmly
to compact the soil.
Step 4

Cut the other three bottles in half, horizontally and keep the bottom halves.

Make two small holes opposite each other, nearest the cut side of the bottle.

Cut three pieces of string, roughly 25cm long and insert each end into the holes. Tie a knot on the ends
to secure them. This will form a “bucket” to collect the water.

Hang them over the necks of each of the three bottles on the board.
Step 5

Slowly pour equal amounts of water into each of the bottles. Pour the water in at the end furthest from
the neck of the bottle.

Take note of the colour of the water collecting in the cups! The water in the first cut is really dirty, the
water from the second and third cups are much cleaner which shows that both mulch as well as the root
structure of plants assist in preventing soil erosion.

Let the kids do this every day for a week or two and they will soon see how the soil erodes away in the
first container while the plants hold the soil in the last one. It’s natures glue, so let’s look after our plants
and while we’re about it … plant some more.

Observations and results

At the start, the soil could probably absorb most of the rain. It acts like a sponge, holding the water.
With a prolonged downpour, however, the soil is not always able to absorb the water fast enough and
you likely observed excess water starting to flow on top of the soil. Sooner or later you should have
observed excess water flowing down, as the soil becomes saturated and could not absorb more water.

The water flowing on top of the soil is called runoff.  As it flows, it carries loose soil with it. The amount
of soil transported depends on the speed and volume of the flowing water as well as the type of soil and
its slope. Although forks cannot hold on to soil as well as plants do, they do help hold it together and
ward off larger layers of soil sliding down. As a result, you probably collected more eroded soil from rain
falling on the bare soil.

More to explore
Can Plants Stop Soil Erosion? from Science Buddies
Water Erosion, from Plant & Soil Sciences eLibrary
Soil Science: How Moist Is That Mud? from Scientific American

The Effects of Soil Erosion

By Kristine Tucker; Updated March 13, 2018

ClaudioVentrella/iStock/GettyImages
Soil erosion is the weathering away of topsoil caused by water, wind or tillage. Pesticides and other
chemicals can get trapped in soil, polluting streams and rivers as the soil breaks apart. Soil erosion can
also lead to mudslides and floods, negatively affecting the structural integrity of buildings and roadways.
Over time, abusive farming and agricultural tilling processes can result in nutrient degradation -- the
decline in soil quality. This type of erosion depletes organic matter in soil, making it less suitable for
planting and harvesting crops or for the natural production of vegetation.

Pollution and Poor Water Quality

The gradual erosion of soil creates sedimentation, a process by which rocks and minerals in the soil
separate from the soil and deposit elsewhere, often lodging in streams and rivers. Pollutants in the soil,
such as fertilizers and pest control agents used to protect crops, also settle in the streams and
rivers. Water pollutants result in poor water quality -- including the quality of drinking water if the
pollutants aren't removed before consumption.

Sedimentation also leads to the excessive growth of algae, as sunlight can get through the sediment.
High levels of algae remove too much oxygen from the water, resulting in the death of aquatic animals
and reduced fish populations, according to the World Wildlife Fund.

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Mudslides and Structural Problems

Soil erosion leads to mudslides, which affect the stability and structural integrity of buildings and
roadways. Mudslides not only affect structures supported by the soil but also buildings and roads that
are in the path of slides. Mudslides occur when fine sand, clay, silt, organic matter and soil spill off the
sides of hills and slopes as a result of the force and energy of heavy rainfall. This runoff occurs quickly, so
there's not enough time for the surface to reabsorb or trap the eroding soil, according to Envirothon, a
program of the National Conservation Foundation and North America's largest high school
environmental education competition.

Deforestation and Flooding

Deforestation -- the removal of trees to create room for cities and farming -- erodes soil. Trees help hold
soil in place, so when they're uprooted, winds and rains push the loose soil and rocks to streams and
rivers, again resulting in unwanted sedimentation. The heavy layers of sediment keep streams and
rivers from flowing smoothly, eventually leading to flooding. Excess water, especially during rainy
seasons and when the snow melts, gets trapped by the sediment and has nowhere to go except back on
land.

Soil Degradation

The degradation of nutrients in soil is often a result of poorly conducted farming and agricultural
practices that lead to soil erosion. Excessive irrigation and outdated tilling practices reduce the amount
of nutrients in the soil and make it less fertile for natural vegetation and agricultural purposes.
According to the Environmental Protection Agency, agricultural methods, such as purposely leaving
organic matter in the soil and ensuring that at least 30 percent of the previous year's crop
residue remain in the soil, increase the fertility and vitality of the soil. In some cases, seeds can be
planted directly in the previous year's crop residue without any further tillage.