Notice of RetractionEffects of Shelterbelts on Wind Erosion Control in the Desertified Cropland of North-Western Shandong Province, China

Notice of Retraction

After careful and considered review of the content of this paper by a duly constituted expert committee, this paper has been found to be in violation of IEEE´s Publication Principles.

We hereby retract the content of this paper. Reasonable effort should be made to remove all past references to this paper.

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Wind erosion can be mitigated by a shelterbelt and shelterbelt nets are used as an agro-technique for dry-farming systems. However, the extent and effectiveness of shelterbelts in erosion-prone areas are unknown. We assess the effects of 6-year old poplar (Populus simonii Carr.) shelterbelts on wind erosion control via wind speed reduction in a desert-sandy land ecosystem. Wind speed dynamics and wind erosion amounts were monitored daily over an erosive period from October 2004 to May 2005 using fixed observation sites located at different positions within the shelterbelts. Three shelterbelt networks (130×300 m, 260×300 m, and 300×400 m grid patterns) were sampled along the transects. Wind-check efficiency (20 cm above the ground surface) behind the windbreaks ranged from 20-52%. These maxima were located at multiples of 3 to 5 windbreak height away from the windbreak. The mean wind-checking efficiencies are 27, 31, and 44% for the 300×400 m, 260×300 m and 130×300 m shelterbelt networks, respectively. Wind erosion amounts inside the shelterbelt networks decreased by 2927 t km^-2. There was a significant exponential relationship (R²=0.97, P<;0.001) between wind erosion amount and wind velocity.