3.4. Soil moisture content
Soil moisture content varied at different slope positions. From toe-slope to summit, soil moisture content declined with increasing altitude, and declined with time corresponding to the decline in frequency and intensity of rain events over the
measurement period (Fig. 2c and d). Moreover, the difference among the four slope positions increased with time between rain events, particularly in the initial 27 days (Fig. 2c and d; Table 2). Average soil moisture content was lowest at summit for both the initial 27 and last 20 day periods (20.4 10.26% and 11.0 3.96%,
respectively) and was the greatest at the toe-slope and back-slope in both the initial 27 days (32.6 7.39% and 30.2 5.53%, respectively) andfinal 20 days (18.5 4.96% and 20.4
4.15%,respectively) (Table 2); the differences between toe-slope and back-slope soil moisture contents were not significant in either period. For the initial 27 days, soil moisture content at toe-slope (greatest) was 11.6% greater than summit (least), and for the last 20 days, soil moisture content at back-slope (greatest) was 9.4% greater than summit (least), the difference became smaller with time (Table 2). In addition, compared with the other threepositions, the soil volumetric moisture content curve at back-slope
was steadier, with smaller fluctuations (Fig. 2c).