Soil water dynamics around a tree on a hillslope with or without rainwater supplied by stemflow

A tree can partition rainfall into throughfall and stemflow (SF), causing water to be funneled around the tree base, and can preferentially divert rainwater in soil layers, causing water to be funneled around tree roots. To determine the effects of each on soil water dynamics, we compared soil water dynamics around a tree on a hillslope on the basis of 2 years of field observations before (SF period) and after (non-SF period) intercepting the stemflow of the tree. Additionally, two sprinkling experiments were conducted using different dye tracers to separately indentify infiltration pathways derived from throughfall and stemflow. The observation results in the SF period showed irregular variations in soil water content, high soil water storage, and significant saturated zone development in the downslope region from the tree, which were attributed to stemflow concentrated on the downslope side of the tree. Although dramatic variations in soil water dynamics disappeared in the non-SF period, asymmetrical soil water response patterns were also observed, which were mainly attributed to root-induced bypass flow. Focusing on the downslope region in the SF and non-SF periods, the frequency of saturated zone generation at the soil-bedrock interface decreased from 58% to 16%, but the frequency of bypass flow occurrence varied little. Saturated zone generation at the soil-bedrock interface underneath the tree in both the SF and non-SF periods suggests that trees are key locations for rainfall infiltration and that tree-induced saturated zone generation should be considered carefully, even in conditions without stemflow supply.