FRACTAL SCALING OF THE HYDRAULIC AND HYDROLOGIC PROPERTIES OF AN ACRISOL

Soils properties show spatial and temporal variability at different scales. The representation of processes and properties at a scale different from the one at which observations and measurements are made is a universal problem in soil science, since these measurements are dependent on the scale of observation. Fractal models assume that this dependence is the same across the range of scale. Due to the self-similar properties of fractals and their representation by the fractal dimension (D), they have prospective as a descriptive tool for scaling up various soil parameters. The objectives of the study were to establish the fractal interpretation of spatial variability of saturated hydraulic conductivity (Ks) and infiltration parameters, and to describe their isotropic nature and potential effect on fractal dimension. Fractal dimensions of collected data were obtained from a log–log scale plot of the variogram. Ks recorded the highest D of 1.936, whereas, that for infiltration rate recorded the lowest of 1.814. Results indicated that soil properties show fractal behaviour which can be used as a tool to assess isotropic variability of soil parameters on a field scale.