Piping Erosion, a Threat or an Opportunity?

Piping erosion is an intensifying erosion due to subsurface flow of water whose emergence and development produces significant changes in landscape, causes land and environmental degradation, and leads to soil and water losses. Moreover, this internal erosion causes surface soil fertility to decline, devastates agricultural farms, and poses threats and damages to local people, livestock, farm machinery, and road networks. From a different perspective, however, piping erosion creates natural habitats in its region of impact for the wildlife. The purpose of this study was to identify the advantageous and disadvantageous potentials of piping erosion in parts of the Iranian Loess Plateau in eastern Golestan Province. For this purpose, all the erosion pipes throughout the study area were surveyed using the measurement tape and their characteristics including shrub species, land use, sloping, and geographical location were recorded. Most were found to be rangelands located in concave slopes in the 20‒45% range. Out of the 348 erosion pipes in the area, 133 hosted trees and shrubs such as pomegranate and fig (more specifically, Paliurus spina, Punica granatum, and Ficus). Evidence showed that this type of erosion in Loess deposits created habitats favorable to plant growth and that it might be considered as an opportunity in land management in semi-arid regions to grow native plants and trees.