JWSS - Journal of Water and Soil Science

Prioritization of sub-watersheds is very important and necessary in order to implement soil and water conservation practices. This study has prioritized 13 sub-watersheds based on morphometric and land use characteristics using RS and GIS techniques in Haraz watershed to identify erosion-prone sub-watersheds. Morphometric characteristics including bifurcation ratio, drainage density, stream frequency, drainage texture, form factor, basin circularity, compactness coefficient, elongation ratio, length of overland flow, shape index, and basin relief were considered in morphometric analysis. Land use map was classified into seven classes of forest, water-body, irrigated farming, bare land, rangeland, orchard and residential area. Finally, sub-watersheds were classified into four categories as very high, high, medium and low in terms of priority for soil conservation. On the basis of morphometric analysis sub-watershed WS-4 was considered as high priority, whereas according to land use analysis, sub-watersheds WS-6, WS-8, WS-12 were in class of high priority. Sub-watershed WS-4 was categorized as a very high priority class based on the integration of morphometric and land use analysis. This region was identified as critical region therefore should be considered as priority class for implementation of soil and water conservation practices.