Modeling the water and sediment dynamics in vegetative filter strips

The primary goal of our study is to model the plant cover influence on water and soil erosion dynamics. The mathematical model consists in Saint-Venant equations coupled with the multiple particle class Hairsine-Rose soil erosion model. The numerical solutions are obtained from a finite volume scheme used to discretize the continuum model, where a second order fractional time step is applied for time integration. The numerical scheme is well-balanced and preserves the positivity of water depth and sediment density functions. The presence of the soil erosion equations do not imposes any restriction on the magnitude of the time step. Secondarily, we apply the general model to study the sediment transport in a vegetative buffer.