Longitudinal river ecohydrology: flow variation down the lengths of alluvial rivers

Larned, Scott T.; Schmidt, Jochen; Datry, Thibault; Konrad, Christopher P.; Dumas, Jennifer K.; Diettrich, Jan C.

doi:10.1002/eco.126

Cited by 72 publications

(77 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…Two flow recorders have been measuring flow at daily intervals since January 1985 (http://www.hydro.eaufrance.fr/). One was located 4 km upstream from the temporary section (St Rambert en Bugey: mean river flow = 6.22 m 3 s -1 ; average annual 7-day low flow = 0.22 m 3 s -1 ), and another within it (St Denis en Bugey: mean river flow = 6.88 m 3 s -1 ; average annual 7-day low flow = 0 m 3 s -1 ) (SIABVA 2000;Larned et al 2010b; Fig. 1).…”

Section: Study Sitesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Flow intermittence controls leaf litter breakdown in a French temporary alluvial river: the “drying memory”

Datry¹,

Corti²,

et al. 2011

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The inputs and breakdown of terrestrial leaf litter in streams is a fundamental ecological process that sustains in-stream foodwebs and secondary production. In temporary rivers, litter breakdown is reduced during dry phases, but the long-term effect of alternating drying and wetting cycles on litter breakdown is still poorly understood. We tested the hypothesis that leaf litter breakdown (LLB) in temporary rivers is primarily controlled by flow permanence (the number of flowing days over a given period expressed in %), and that drying events affect LLB during leaf fall periods through reduction of microbial activity and the modification of aquatic invertebrate assemblages. LLB rates (k), microbial activity and invertebrate assemblages were determined in winter at ten crosssections scattered along a flow permanence gradient on the temporary Albarine River, France. Results demonstrated that summer drying events affected the breakdown process for up to 6 months after flow has resumed in the river. LLB rates decreased exponentially with decreasing flow permanence, and with increasing drying event duration and frequency. These exponential relationships were observed for flow permanence variables calculated for the river for both 24-years and 1-year time periods prior to the experiment. A decrease in flow permanence from 100 to 85% led to a four-fold decrease in leaf litter breakdown rate. Microbial activity, which typically did not differ between cross-sections, failed to explain the betweencross-section differences in k. By contrast, invertebrate assemblages and, shredders, in particular, decreased exponentially with decreasing flow permanence and with increasing drying event duration and frequency.

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Section: Study Sitesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Flow intermittence controls leaf litter breakdown in a French temporary alluvial river: the “drying memory”

Datry¹,

Corti²,

et al. 2011

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“…Many river networks in arid regions are entirely intermittent (Jacobson and Jacobson, 2013;Meirovich et al, 1998). Temporal patterns of flow intermittence range from near-perennial flow regimes with infrequent, short periods of zero flow to episodic flow regimes with rare flow events separated by long zero-flow periods (Crocker et al, 2003;Houston, 2006;Larned et al, 2011;Meirovich et al, 1998). In turn, the duration and frequency of zero-flow periods are increasingly viewed as the primary determinants of river ecosystem processes (Corti et al, 2011;Datry et al, 2011;Dieter et al, 2011) and biotic communities (Arscott et al, 2010;Datry, 2012;Davey and Kelly, 2007).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Regionalization of patterns of flow intermittence from gauging station records

Snelder

Datry

Lamouroux

et al. 2013

Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci.

117

127

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Abstract. Understanding large-scale patterns in flow intermittence is important for effective river management. The duration and frequency of zero-flow periods are associated with the ecological characteristics of rivers and have important implications for water resources management. We used daily flow records from 628 gauging stations on rivers with minimally modified flows distributed throughout France to predict regional patterns of flow intermittence. For each station we calculated two annual times series describing flow intermittence; the frequency of zero-flow periods (consecutive days of zero flow) in each year of record (FREQ; yr −1 ), and the total number of zero-flow days in each year of record (DUR; days). These time series were used to calculate two indices for each station, the mean annual frequency of zero-flow periods (mFREQ; yr −1 ), and the mean duration of zero-flow periods (mDUR; days). Approximately 20 % of stations had recorded at least one zero-flow period in their record. Dissimilarities between pairs of gauges calculated from the annual times series (FREQ and DUR) and geographic distances were weakly correlated, indicating that there was little spatial synchronization of zero flow. A flow-regime classification for the gauging stations discriminated intermittent and perennial stations, and an intermittence classification grouped intermittent stations into three classes based on the values of mFREQ and mDUR. We used random forest (RF) models to relate the flow-regime and intermittence classifications to several environmental characteristics of the gauging station catchments. The RF model of the flow-regime classification had a cross-validated Cohen's kappa of 0.47, indicating fair performance and the intermittence classification had poor performance (cross-validated Cohen's kappa of 0.35). Both classification models identified significant environment-intermittence associations, in particular with regional-scale climate patterns and also catchment area, shape and slope. However, we suggest that the fair-to-poor performance of the classification models is because intermittence is also controlled by processes operating at scales smaller catchments, such as groundwater-table fluctuations and seepage through permeable channels. We suggest that high spatial heterogeneity in these small-scale processes partly explains the low spatial synchronization of zero flows. While 20 % of gauges were classified as intermittent, the flow-regime model predicted 39 % of all river segments to be intermittent, indicating that the gauging station network under-represents intermittent river segments in France. Predictions of regional patterns in flow intermittence provide useful information for applications including environmental flow setting, estimating assimilative capacity for contaminants, designing bio-monitoring programs and making preliminary predictions of the effects of climate change on flow intermittence.

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“…This could arise from increased transmission loss, or decrease in lateral inputs from hillslopes or riparian areas. Most of the reaches where downstream loss in Q was observed did not appear to have the morphologic features -deep alluvium in an unconfined valley or a contact between different lithologies-that typically contribute to the presence of a 20 strongly losing reach (Larned et al 2011, Konrad 2006.…”

Section: Downstream Declines In Yieldmentioning

confidence: 96%

Spatial and Temporal Variability in Baseflow in the Mattole River Headwaters, California, USA

Queener¹,

Stubblefield

2016

Preprint

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Abstract.Increases in human population, water use, and climate change have the potential to increase water stress and scarcity particularly in ecosystems with pronounced seasonality in precipitation, yet our understanding of the landscape features that control baseflows remains limited. Repeated synoptic measurements of streamflow in small streams (basin area 10 . Unit-area yields varied widely, and this variation increased as flows declined at most sites. In nested basins, downstream declines in both discharge and unit-area yield were common. Basins with greater summer flow and a slower baseflow 15 recession had steeper slopes, higher elevations, less flat ground and narrower valleys, more dissected and strongly convergent topography, and more precipitation. The difference in water yield among basins was much greater than the difference in precipitation, likely resulting from varying basin water inputs, storage capacity, and routing. The positive correlation between basin steepness and flow is attributable to the thickness of the weathered bedrock layer in water storage, and more rapid bedrock weathering in steeper basins with higher rates of uplift resulting in greater basin storage capacity. 20Results show that basins in a small geographic area (<85 km 2 ) and with fairly similar geology, vegetation, and topography may generate widely differing baseflow. Streams with naturally low baseflows are particularly susceptible to water diversion. Low-gradient streams essential for coho salmon rearing may be particularly susceptible to climate change or water diversions that reduce streamflow. 25

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Longitudinal river ecohydrology: flow variation down the lengths of alluvial rivers

Cited by 72 publications

References 53 publications

Flow intermittence controls leaf litter breakdown in a French temporary alluvial river: the “drying memory”

Flow intermittence controls leaf litter breakdown in a French temporary alluvial river: the “drying memory”

Regionalization of patterns of flow intermittence from gauging station records

Spatial and Temporal Variability in Baseflow in the Mattole River Headwaters, California, USA

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