Tomáš Dostál

• Professor
• Head of Department at Czech Technical University in Prague

This study investigates the dynamics of sediment and phosphorus transport in small streams affected by recurrent flood waves. The experiments were carried out in two streams with contrasting conditions: one in an agricultural headwater section, which serves as a sediment source, and the other in a mid-water section influenced by fish ponds. High-fr...

Soil erosion is a major threat to soil resources. Our ACRP-supported project EROS-A aims to improve erosion modelling by investigating the role of extreme precipitation and associated erosivity on soil erosion in the Main Agricultural Production Zones (MAPZ) of Austria. For this purpose, it is important to separate precipitation events into differe...

This study applies the WaTEM/SEDEM model, a watershed-scale model based on the Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE), to enhance sustainable watershed management by identifying high-erosion-risk areas for targeted mitigation at various scales. It focuses on identifying potential errors in using statewide or worldwide land use data layers derived from...

Preventing and reversing soil degradation is essential to maintaining the ecosystem services provided by soils and guaranteeing food security. In addition to the scientific community, it is critical to engage multiple stakeholders to assess the degree of soil degradation and mitigation strategies' impact and meet the United Nations' Sustainable Dev...

Every application of soil erosion models brings the need of proper parameterisation, that is, finding physically or conceptually plausible parameter values that allow a model to reproduce measured values. No universal approach for model parameterisation, calibration and validation exists, as it depends on the model, spatial and temporal resolution...

The Jet Erosion Test (JET) is a method for determining the erodibility of incohesive agricultural soils by measuring the critical shear stress. The measurements were performed using a modified Mini-JET device, which is well-suited for field measurements as it is small, light, requires a relatively small amount of water, and can be operated by a sin...

Citation: Kvítek, T.; Zajíček, A.; Dostál, T.; Fučík, P.; Krása, J.; Bauer, M.; Jáchymová, B.; Kulhavý, Z.; Pavel, M. Slowing Abstract: Non-point sources of water pollution caused by agricultural crop production are a serious problem in Czechia, at present. This paper describes a new approach for the mutual delineation and assessment of different p...

In the Czech Republic, the Universal Soil Loss Equation provides the basis for defining the soil protection strategy. Field rainfall simulators were used to define the actual cover-management factor values of the most extensively seeded crops in the Czech Republic. The second purpose was to assess rainfall-runoff ratio for different crops and manag...

Abstract: Soil health is a significant problem in agriculture which demands a tailor-made approach. The study aims to develop a methodological approach for farm typology construction in terms of soil health. TUdi project, under which was made this study, aims to transform unsustainable management of soils in key cropping systems in Europe and China...

In the Czech Republic, the Universal Soil Loss Equation provides the basis for defining the soil protection strategy. Field rainfall simulators were used to define the actual cover-management factor values of the most extensively seeded crops in the Czech Republic. More than 380 simulations between 2016 and 2021 provided data. The methodology focus...

Every application of soil erosion models brings the need of proper parametrization, i.e., finding physically or conceptually plausible parameter values that allow a model to reproduce measured values. No universal approach for model parametrization, calibration and validation exists, as it depends on the model, spatial and temporal resolution and t...

Although wheel tracks cover only a small portion of the surface of agricultural fields, their effect on surface runoff and sediment transport is substantial. Wheel tracks change the microrelief of the soil surface, and influence how the surface is further altered by rainfall and runoff. This study presents a plot-scale microrelief analysis of a til...

The Czech landscape has undergone various changes over the last 100 years and has been mainly adapted agriculturally for economic purposes. This has resulted, among other things, in reservoirs being clogged with sediment. The Vrchlice Reservoir was built in 1970 to supply drinking water for around 50,000 inhabitants, and increased sedimentation has...

Reinforcing the small water cycle is considered to be a holistic approach to both water resource and landscape management. In an agricultural landscape, this can be accomplished by incorporating agricultural conservation practices; their incorporation can reduce surface runoff, increase infiltration, and increase the water holding capacity of a soi...

Accelerated soil erosion is a major threat to soil, and there are great variations in the rate of soil erosion over time due to natural and human-induced factors. The temperate forest zone of Russia is characterized by complex stages of land-use history (i.e. active urbanization, agricultural development, land abandonment, etc.). We have for the fi...

The present study investigated the effects of changes in landscape configuration on river water quality, which is calculated by chemical export coefficients, using spatial data onto 31 catchments in the southwestern part of the Caspian Sea basin by applying stepwise multivariate regression models. The water quality modeling has been carried out app...

For the Czech Republic to recover from the effects of past mismanagement, it is necessary to determine how its landscape management can be improved holistically by reinforcing the small water cycle. We conducted a scenario analysis across four time periods using SWAT (Soil and Water Assessment Tool) to determine the effects of land use, land manage...

In this study, the soil erosion regulation ecosystem services of the CORINE land use/ land cover types along with soil intrinsic features and geomorphological factors were examined by using the soil erosion data of 327 catchments in Poland, with a mean area of 510 ± 330 km 2 , applying a multivariate regression modeling approach. The results showed...

A good understanding of soil moisture spatial patterns is useful for assessing the hydrological connectivity and runoff generation processes in a catchment. Thus, we have applied numerical modelling approaches to investigate the spatial patterns of soil moisture at the Nučice experimental catchment (0.531 km2) in the Czech Republic. The catchment w...

Soil hydraulic properties (SHP) can be affected by many different factors including: management practices (tillage practices, crop residue management), land use, or natural phenomena (fires, intensive rainfall, drought). Changes in SHP may have a negative impact on infiltration, soil water balance or plant water availability. Although changes of SH...

Článek popisuje metodu stanovení erodovatelnosti nesoudržných zemědělských půd pomocí měření kritického tečného napětí. Pro určení kritického tečného napětí byl použit tzv. „Jet Erosion Test“ (JET). Měření bylo provedeno pomocí modifikované zmenšené verze zařízení Mini-JET. Zařízení je velmi vhodné pro terénní měření, neboť je malé, lehké, spotřebu...

An understanding of splash erosion is the basis to describe the impact of rain characteristics on soil disturbance. In typical splash cup experiments, splashed soil is collected, filtered and weighed. As a way to collect additional data, our experiments have been supplemented by a photogrammetric approach. A total of three soils were tested across...

We introduce the freely‐available web‐based WALNUD dataset (Water in Agricultural Landscape – NUčice Database) that includes both hydrological and meteorological records at the Nučice experimental catchment (0.53 km²), which is representative of an intensively farmed landscape in the Czech Republic. The Nučice experimental catchment was established...

Soil erosion by water is one of the most severe soil degradation processes. Splash erosion is the initial stage of soil erosion by water, resulting from the destructive force of rain drops acting on soil surface aggregates. Apart from rainfall properties, constant soil physical properties (texture and soil organic matter) are crucial in understandi...

Rainfall simulators are one of the most popular research devices for studying the impacts of rainfall on activation of runoff, infiltration, and sediment transport mobilization in the landscape. The research covers also related processes such as generation mechanisms of overland flow, interrail and rill erosion, soil compaction, soil surface change...

In the face of future climate change, Europe has encouraged the adoption of biofuel crops by its farmers. Such land-use changes can have significant impacts on the water balance and hydrological behavior of a system. While the heavy pesticide use associated with biofuel crops has been extensively studied, the water balance impacts of these crops ha...

Reliable estimations of soil physical quality provide valuable information for the evaluation and advancement of agricultural soil management strategies. In the agriculturally highly productive Pannonian basin in Eastern Austria, little emphasis has been placed on the determination of soil physical quality and corresponding soil degradation risks....

Accelerated soil erosion by water has many offsite impacts on the municipal infrastructure. This paper discusses how to easily detect potential risk points around municipalities by simple spatial analysis using GIS. In the Czech Republic, the WaTEM/SEDEM model is verified and used in large scale studies to assess sediment transports. Instead of com...

Featured Application: Practical and cost-effective splash cup method for splash erosion measurements in field and laboratory conditions. Abstract: The interaction between rainfall erosivity parameters and splash erosion is crucial for describing the soil erosion process; however, it is rarely investigated under natural rainfall conditions. In this...

In the European Union, soil erosion is identified as one of the main environmental threats, addressed with a variety of rules and regulations for soil and water conservation. The by far most often officially used tool to determine soil erosion is the Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE) and its regional adaptions. The aim of this study is to use thr...

Soil erosion through various water processes is a worldwide problem. This research is focused on raindrops' impact on soil surfaces, which is generally considered the initial stage of the erosion process. Splash erosion monitoring was conducted across three experimental sites: Petzenkirchen, Mistelbach (Austria) and Prague (Czech Republic). At each...

Soil erosion by water is affected by the rainfall erosivity, which controls the initial detachment and mobilization of soil particles. Rainfall erosivity is expressed through the rainfall intensity (I) and the rainfall kinetic energy (KE). KE–I relationships are an important tool for rainfall erosivity estimation, when direct measurement of KE is n...

This article outlines the major scientific objectives of the SHui project that seeks to optimize soil and water use in agricultural systems in the EU and China, by considering major current scientific challenges in this area. SHui (for Soil Hydrology research platform underpinning innovation to manage water scarcity in European and Chinese cropping...

Optical disdrometers can be used to estimate rainfall erosivity; however, the relative accuracy of different disdrometers is unclear. This study compared three types of optical laser-based disdrometers to quantify differences in measured rainfall characteristics and to develop correction factors for kinetic energy (KE). Two identical PWS100 (Campbe...

A rainfall simulator is a common laboratory tool for soil erosion research. Typical objective of the rainfall experiments is the evaluation of various factors on soil erosion processes, such as the effect of rainfall intensity, rainfall duration, soil characteristics, soil management, crop residues on the soil surface, plot’s slope and length. The...

An experimental laboratory setup was developed and evaluated in order to investigate detachment of soil particles by raindrop splash impact. The soil under investigation was a silty loam Cambisol, which is typical for agricultural fields in Central Europe. The setup consisted of a rainfall simulator and soil samples packed into splash cups (a plast...

Soil moisture in the topsoil is an essential variable that influences the hydrological connection between the atmosphere and the subsurface. An accurate estimation of the soil moisture distribution in the topsoil provides a better understanding for the water cycle and the runoff routing in agricultural catchments. In this study, we setup spatially...

This paper addresses changes in land use and in the spatial distribution of land units and their influence on the soil erosion risk in two areas with a different geomorphology and a different historical and political development: an intensively-used lowland agricultural watershed in central Bohemia, Czech Republic, and a partially hilly agricultura...

Intense rainfall-runoff events and subsequent soil erosion can cause serious damage to the infrastructure in residential areas in Europe countries and all over the world. In the Czech Republic, the Ministry of the Interior has supported an analysis dealing with the risks to residents, infrastructure, and water bodies from flash floods and sediment...

The aim of this contribution is to assess effect of seedbed cultivation and wheel-track compaction on runoff dynamics with a special regard on shallow subsurface processes which haven’t been often taken into the account. Two artificial rainfall experiments on two plots with and without wheel-track were undertaken during the measuring campaign. Surf...

Research of water regime on cultivated soils is important for planning of landscape protection measures which help to preserve the water in the landscape. The aim of this contribution is to assess effect of seedbed cultivation and wheel-track compaction on runoff dynamics with a special regard on shallow subsurface processes which haven’t been ofte...

Rainfall simulator is a common tool used to study the impact of rainfall on soil. This study presents the effect of various rainfall intensities and related kinetic energies to splash erosion under controlled experimental conditions. We used “Norton ladder” laboratory rainfall simulator to recurrently simulate several rainfall patterns with given k...

Field observations and consecutive modelling of soil erosion events proved to be essential for understanding and predicting erosion and sediment transport. An experimental approach often utilizes a large variety of rainfall simulators. In this technical note a complex methodology is introduced, using a mobile rainfall simulator developed at the Cze...

The objective of the Methodology for assessment of pollution sources influence on water reservoirs eutrophication is to provide a universal guide to identify all significant anthropogenic sources of phosphorus in the basin of any water reservoir and determine their potential for eutrophication. Eutrophication potential in this methodology is define...

Long term tillage has led to soil profile degradation in many cultivated fields. The topsoil is disturbed by plowing. The movement of fine particles from the topsoil to the subsoil and direct pressure from agricultural machinery create an abrupt delineation in the form of a plough pan with very low permeability. The plough pan prevents water infilt...

This paper presents the methodology used for artificial flood experiments conducted in a small artificial, trained (regulated) channel on the Nučice experimental agricultural catchment (0.5 km2), central Czech Republic, and the results of the experiments. The aim was to monitor the transformation of the flood wave and the sediment transport within...

This paper presents the methodology used for artificial flood experiments conducted in a small artificial, trained (regulated) channel on the Nučice experimental agricultural catchment (0.5 km²), central Czech Republic, and the results of the experiments. Two series of experiments were carried out in contrasting initial conditions: (a) in summer, w...

The EU Water Framework Directive aims to ensure restoration of Europe’s water bodies to “good ecological status” by 2027. Many Member States will struggle to meet this target, with around half of EU river catchments currently reporting below standard water quality. Diffuse pollution from agriculture represents a major pressure, affecting over 90% o...

Many sources of pollution in the reservoirs and lakes watershed may contribute to the eutrophication of water in varying degrees. About significance of phosphorus sources decides emitted forms of phosphorus mainly, but it also affects localization of sources in the watershed, seasonal intake, amount of retention elements between source and the rese...

The fact that flash floods initiated in arable catchments are often accompanied by massive sediment and nutrient loads often leads to the assumption that surface runoff is the principle pathway by which runoff reaches watercourses. On the basis of an evaluation of several rainfall-runoff events in a representative agricultural catchment, we show th...

Soil erosion represents a natural hazard not only because of on-site soil loss. The eroded sediment is transported into neighboring environments and causes serious impacts as muddy floods, reservoir siltation, eutrophication and pollution of water bodies. These off-site damages can be very costly, affect a lot of people and contaminate water-resour...

In this paper the data measured by application of the MDS NZ2 field rainfall simulator have been used to demonstrate the effect of vegetation cover on surface runoff generation and soil loss. The results of 15 experiments for two crops (oats and wheat) are presented. Canopy cover and the leaf area index are used to describe the vegetation developme...

Rainfall simulators are used in numerous experiments to study runoff and soil erosion characteristics. However, they usually differ in their construction details, rainfall generation, plot size and other technical parameters. As field experiments using medium to large scale rainfall simulators (plot length 3-8 m) are very much time and labor consum...

Jakub Jankovec Výzkumný ústav rostlinné výroby, v.v.i. • Vilém Pavlů • Jan Gaisler • Lenka Pavlů • František Paška Doba projektu: od září 2012 do září 2014 Číslo projektu: 100114993 Projekt byl financován z prostředků EU a ze státního rozpočtu České republiky. http://aquanisa.ihi-zittau.de ISBN 978-3-86780-404-2

Soil erosion by water is one of the main degradation processes on agricultural lands in the Czech Republic. The team on Department of Irrigation, Drainage and Landscape Engineering at the Czech Technical University in Prague have been involved in experimental measuring of surface runoff, soil erosion and soil transport processes for several decades...

Soil erosion by water is one of the main degradation processes on agricultural lands in the Czech Republic. The team on Department of Irrigation, Drainage and Landscape Engineering at the Czech Technical University in Prague have been involved in experimental measuring of surface runoff, soil erosion and soil transport processes for several decades...

The importance of soil loss by water erosion becomes more eminent with the ongoing climate change, where more extreme precipitations in middle Europe are anticipated. The amount of soil transported from the field plot can substantially differ according to the intensity of rill erosion. The capability of mathematical models to predict appearance of...

V příspěvku je představen metodický koncept hodnocení eutrofizačního potenciálu zdrojů fosforu v povodí libovolné vodní nádrže. Eutrofizační potenciál je zde chápán jako mnohorozměrná funkce velikosti produkce fosforu, podílu emitovaných forem fosforu, vzdálenosti od nádrže, sezónnosti emisí a množství retenčních prvků mezi zdrojem a nádrží. Umožňu...

To help the implementation of Water Framework Directive in the Czech Republic the four-year project was set-up to assess eutrophication factors in endangered catchments. The assessed area covers approximately 40% of the area of the Czech Republic (almost 31 500 km2). The erosion phosphorus loads are modeled by WATEM/SEDEM model adapted for the purp...

Sediments and nutrients washed out from farmed catchments into rivers and reservoirs are one of the major environmental problems worldwide. Understanding the routing of the precipitated water, its pathways and residence time in the subsurface are important prerequisites for water management, flood and nutrient control. To determine a proper linkage...

The paper presents results of surface runoff, soil erosion and sediment transport modeling using Erosion 3D software - physically based mathematical simulation model, event oriented, fully distributed. Various methods to simulate technical soil-erosion conservation measures were tested, using alternative digital elevation models of different precis...

BoBB (Bodenerosion, Beratung, Berechnung) is simple software to support instant assessment of soil erosion hazard on agricultural fields. The program is profile-oriented, implementing the RUSLE model with slight changes allowing it to assess and compare different farming practices especially the soil-conservation field management. The input paramet...

V př'ispvevku je představen metodický koncept hodnocen'i eutrofizavcn'iho potenciálu zdrojů fosforu v povod'i libovolné vodn'i nádrvze. Eutrofizavcn'i potenciál je zde chápán jako mnohorozmverná funkce velikosti produkce fosforu, pod'ilu emitovaných forem fosforu, vzdálenosti od nádrvze, sezónnosti emis'i a mnovzstv'i retenvcn'ich prvků mezi zdroje...

Hodnocení ohroženosti vodních nádrží sedimentem a eutrofizací podmíněnou erozí zemědělské půdy certifikovaná metodika pro praxi Metodika je připravena ve spolupráci institucí v rámci projektu QI102A265. Vydalo ČVUT v Praze, Fakulta stavební, 2013

As in most recent years, there were again serious flood events in the Czech Republic and all over the world in 2010. This situation has been focusing attention on effective measures for controlling floods. Discussions have covered not just implementing purely technical flood control measures but also the feasibility of integrating the natural poten...

Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE) is a widely used tool for the assessment of soil erosion in the Czech Republic as well as in many other countries. C factor is one of the six factors composing USLE. This factor represents vegetation cover and management on agricultural land. Its values were derived based on a comparison of the soil loss from a p...

This contribution presents a software tool for calculation and prediction of soil erosion and surface runoff from agricultural lands. There is no universal tool to properly describe the origin and the processes related to the surface runoff and sediment transport in different scales. For a design of any technical erosion control measures, that are...

The question of possible flood control and flood mitigation measures and their effects is still challenging. While the effect of purely technical flood control measures such as dams or levees is sufficiently described by using any of widely spread or more specific models, the effectiveness of close-to-nature ones (river restoration, appropriate lan...

One of main topics of interdisciplinary project NIVA – Water Retention in Floodplains and Possibilities of Retention Capacity Increase is the assessment of flood wave transformation in the floodplain. The project focuses on broad field of floodplain ecosystem services and flood mitigation is a phenomenon which is researched by the team from Czech T...

The effect of the conditions of a landscape on its retention capacity Questions related to the occurrence, frequency, intensity, duration, characteristics and causes of floods have been discussed more in recent years. Two basic approaches to flood control often conflict. The first is based on the assumption of the considerable effect of a landscape...

The river Lužnice floodplain in south Bohemia with a preserved floodplain ecosystem and hydrological regime has been investigated for selected ecosystem services (ES): flood mitigation, biodiversity refuge, carbon sequestration, and production of commodities. Two contrasting scenarios at 5 km long studying floodplain segment were compared: near-nat...

Flood wave transformation in the floodplain is the phenomenon which is researched within interdisciplinary project NIVA - Water Retention in Floodplains and Possibilities of Retention Capacity Increase. The project focuses on broad range of floodplain ecosystem services and mitigation of flooding is one of them. Despite main influence on flood wave...

Sediment transport and water quality in Máchovo Lake (Czech Republic) Máchovo Lake is a historical reservoir founded by Czech King Charles IV. in 14th century. Located in northern part of central Bohemia it has been widely used for recreation purposes for many decades (or even centuries). Its catchments (ca 100 sq km) consist of intensively used ag...