Corpuscular metallic tracers as a means to detect small-scale soil movement during mechanized logging operations

• Grant number: 11/09697-9
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research
• Start date: February 27, 2012
• End date: February 26, 2013
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Forestry Resources and Forestry Engineering - Techniques and Operations in Forestry
• Principal Investigator: Paulo Torres Fenner
• Grantee: Paulo Torres Fenner
• Host Investigator: Ernst Hildebrand
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Ciências Agronômicas (FCA). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Botucatu. Botucatu , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: University of Freiburg, Germany

Abstract

Soil erosion is a global problem and the quantification is expensive and laborious. The soil can be deformed by forest operations and the magnitude depends of several factors. Understand the relations between machinery traffic, soil damages and the effects to forests are the first steps to avoid or minimize the damages. Authors verified that the base of machines trails has characteristic of the subsoil horizons indicating that part of the upper soil layers are not compacted, but simply displaced. The aim of this project is to develop and test methods to monitoring and quantify displacement of soil layers due to different forestry operations. Corpuscular tracers made from different metals and with different sizes will be used. The uper soil layers movement will be monitored by tracer position using a metal detector. (AU)