Estimation of sediment yield from forest micro-watershed of Shivalik region

Present study was carried out for development of sediment yield model using the event wise historical observations on runoff and sediment yield of a forest micro-watershed in Shivalik foothill. An attempt was made to demonstrate the general ability of erosion models such as Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE) and Modified Universal Soil Loss Equation (MUSLE) to estimate sediment yields from forest micro watershed. Values of K, LS, C and P of USLE and MUSLE on the basis of vegetation density, type of soil and slope of watershed were worked out. Empirical coefficients ‘a’ and ‘b’ of MUSLE were also determined as 9.04 and 0.44 respectively from the calibration set and then the equation was tested for a new set of data. The estimated values of sediment yield by MUSLE were found very close to observed values. This developed model can be used for estimating event wise sediment yields by MUSLE for similar watersheds in the region.