The hydrological and biogeochemical monitoring of catchments has become a common approach for studying the effect of the evolution of agricultural practices on water resources. In numerous studies, the catchment is used as a “mega-lysimeter” to calculate annual input-output budgets. However, the literature reflects two opposite interpretations of the trends of nitrate concentration in streamwat...

[1] The effects of catchment size and landscape organization on runoff generation are poorly understood. Little research has integrated hillslope and riparian runoff investigation across catchments of different sizes to decipher first-order controls on runoff generation. We investigated the role of catchment sizes on riparian and hillslope dynamics based on hydrometric and tracer data observed ...

As in many areas of high relief, debris flows are an important process linkage between hillslopes and the Green River in the canyons of the eastern Uinta Mountains, yet the physical conditions that lead to debris flow initiation are unknown. A recent episode of enhanced debris-flow and wildfire activity provided an opportunity to examine the geomorphic impact of fire and the processes by which ...

Environmental flow assessment frameworks have begun to consider changes to flow regimes resulting from land-use change. Urban stormwater runoff, which degrades streams through altered volume, pattern and quality of flow, presents a problem that challenges dominant approaches to stormwater and water resource management, and to environmental flow assessment. We used evidence of ecological respons...

[ I ] This study uses time series analysis to examine long-term stream water nitrate concentration records from a pair of forested catchments at the Coweeta Hydrologic Laboratory, North Carolina, USA. Monthly average concentrations were available from 1970 through 1997 for two forested catchments, one of which was clear-felled in 1977 and the other maintained as a control. The time series were ...

Human-induced changes to river loads of nutrients and sediments pose a significant threat to marine ecosystems. Ongoing land-use change can further increase these loads, and amplify the impacts of land-based threats on vulnerable marine ecosystems. Consequently, there is a need to assess these threats and prioritise actions to mitigate their impacts. A key question regarding prioritisation is w...

[1] The hydrological budget of Himalayan rivers is dominated by monsoonal rainfall and snowmelt, but their relative impact is not well established because this remote region lacks a dense gauge network. Here, we use a combination of validated remotely‐sensed climate parameters to characterize the spatiotemporal distribution of rainfall, snowfall, and evapotranspiration in order to quantify thei...

Large losses of habitat could be caused by land use change that disrupts the dispersal networks used by migratory species. We assessed the relative losses of habitat for diadromous fish (i.e., those migrating between sea and freshwater) due to physical barriers, degradation of migratory passage associated with catchment land use, and site-scale land use characteristics on the West Coast, South ...

Catchments as space-time filters – a joint spatio-temporal geostatistical analysis of runoff and precipitation J. O. Skøien and G. Blöschl Institute for Hydraulic and Water Resources Engineering, Vienna University of Technology, Karlsplatz 13, 1040 Vienna, Austria Received: 29 March 2006 – Accepted: 21 April 2006 – Published: 12 June 2006 Correspondence to: J. O. Skøien ([email protected])

Differences in hydrologic response across the rain-snow transition in the southern Sierra Nevada were studied in eight headwater catchments – the Kings River Experimental Watersheds – using continuous precipitation, snowpack, and streamflow measurements. The annual runoff ratio (discharge divided by precipitation) increased about 0.1 per 300 m of mean catchment elevation over the range 1,800-2,...