Currently, due to prolonged soil drought, dehydrated peat soils are particularly exposed to subsidence and, as a consequence, even to disappearance from the natural environment, in which they perform many important functions, e.g. storage of organic carbon and water retention. Therefore, predicting of settlement and disappearance processes of these soils is very important issue. This study was conducted to: (1) determine the degree and rate of subsidence of a drained peatland over 40 years, (2) establish the effect of subsidence on the depth of ditches and a watercourse, (3) verify empirical equations describing the subsidence based on field measurements. The work was carried out on fen in Central Poland which was managed as a grassland until around 2000, and then its use was discontinued. Subsidence rate was estimated from measurements of the peat deposit thickness taken in 11 locations in 1978 and 2018. Fourteen empirical equations used for estimating subsidence rate of drained peatlands were selected to verify the calculations against field data. The average subsidence rate of the studied peatland was relativity low (0.62 cm year⁻¹), which may be associated with abandoning of agricultural use for the last 20 years. Loss of peat thickness varied from 5 to 41% and depended rather on drainage intensity than on its initial depth. In general, six from the verified empirical equations were useful in estimating average subsidence rate. Four equations seemed to be the most useful for deeply drained sites. Estimation of the subsidence solely on the basis of time since drainage may be biased.

中文翻译：

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波兰中部泥炭地沉降速率经验方程的验证

当前，由于长期的土壤干旱，脱水的泥炭土壤特别容易沉陷，结果甚至从自然环境中消失，在自然环境中它们发挥许多重要作用，例如有机碳的存储和保水。因此，预测这些土壤的沉降和消失过程是非常重要的问题。进行这项研究的目的是：（1）确定40年内泥炭流失的程度和速率，（2）确定沉降对沟渠和水道深度的影响，（3）验证描述沉降的经验方程根据实地测量。这项工作是在波兰中部的芬（Fen）进行的，该地区一直作为草原管理，直到2000年左右，然后停止使用。根据1978年和2018年在11个地点进行的泥炭沉积厚度测量，估算了沉降速率。选择了14个用于估算排水泥炭地沉降速率的经验方程式，以对照现场数据验证计算结果。所研究泥炭地的平均沉降率相对较低（0.62 cm年）^-1），这可能与最近20年放弃农业用途有关。泥炭厚度的损失从5％到41％不等，主要取决于排水强度而不是其初始深度。通常，从已验证的经验方程式中，有六个可用于估计平均沉降率。四个方程对于深水站点似乎最有用。自排水以来的时间，仅根据时间估算沉降可能会产生偏差。