Effects of Different Factors on Water Flow and Solute Transport Investigated by Time Domain Reflectometry in Sandy Clay Loam Field Soil

Factors affecting preferential flow and transport in the vadose zone need to be investigated by experiments and simulations to protect groundwater against surface applied chemicals. The objectives of this study were to investigate the effects of several factors (soil structure, initial soil water content (SWC), and application rate) and their interactions on the extent of preferential flow and transport in a sandy clay loam field soil using the time domain reflectometry (TDR) for measuring SWC and electrical conductivity (EC) in 12 treatments, modeling (by HYDRUS-1D and VS2DTI) the measured SWC and EC, and conducting statistical tests for comparing the means of the measured and modeled SWC and EC and solute transport parameters (pore water velocity and dispersion coefficient) obtained by inversely fitting in the CXTFIT program. The study results showed that the applied solution moved faster in the undisturbed, wet initial SWC, and higher application rate experimental conditions than in the disturbed, dry initial SWC, and lower application rate, respectively, based on the analysis of the changes in TDR measured SWC and EC with depth at 1, 2, 5, and 15 h of the experiments. However, the effects of interactive factors or treatments on water flow and solute transport were not clear enough. The modeling results showed that HYDRUS-1D was better than VS2DTI in the estimation of EC and especially SWC, but overall the models had relatively low performances in the simulations. Statistical test results also showed that the treatments had different flow and transport characteristics because they were divided into different groups in terms of the means of SWC and EC and solute transport parameters. These results suggest that similar experiments with more distinct interactions and modeling studies with different approaches need to be considered for better understanding the complex flow and transport processes in the vadose zone.