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SOIL PHYSICS

Correlation between Air Permeability and Saturated Hydraulic Conductivity: Unburned and Burned Soils

^a Desert Research Institute, 755 E. Flamingo Rd., Las Vegas, NV 89119
^b Dep. of Hydrology and Water Resources, Univ. of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721-0011
^c Currently at 3TIER Environmental Forecast Group, Inc., 2001 Sixth Ave., Suite 2100, Seattle, WA 98121

^* Corresponding author (karletta.chief{at}dri.edu).

Prior research has shown a log–log correlation between ex situ air permeability (k_a) measured at a matric potential of –50 and –100 cm H₂O and saturated hydraulic conductivity (K_sat) in agricultural soils. We examined the applicability of a previously established log k_a vs. log K_sat predictive relation in unburned and burned woodland–chaparral and coniferous soils. Specifically, we measured in situ k_a in the field using the soil corer air permeameter (SCAP) and measured laboratory K_sat on soil cores. To determine postfire soil physical changes, K_sat was transformed into water permeability, k_w. Then k_a and k_w were compared in unburned and burned soils. The median k_a was lower and median k_w was higher in burned than unburned woodland–chaparral soils. The median k_a and k_w were both lower in burned than unburned coniferous soils. Despite these effects, the 95% prediction interval of the predictive relation includes 80% of the burned soils and 83% of all desert soils. The RMSE values of the predicted log K_sat and measured log K_sat were 0.371, 0.552, 0.588, and 0.511 m d^–1 for unburned and burned woodland–chaparral and unburned and burned coniferous soils, respectively. In comparison, the RMSE for the predicted and measured log K_sat was 0.654 m d^–1 for an agricultural data set. The overall RMSE for unburned and burned soils including the agricultural soils was 0.551 m d^–1. This suggests that the predictive relation is applicable for unburned and burned desert soils for in situ k_a measurements.

Abbreviations: BCA, bias-corrected and accelerated • CF, cumulative fraction • PI, prediction interval • SCAP, soil corer air permeameter