SpringerLink
Log in

Dynamics of storm-driven suspended sediments in a headwater catchment described by multivariable modeling

  • SOILS, SEC 3 • HILLSLOPE AND RIVER BASIN SEDIMENT DYNAMICS • RESEARCH ARTICLE
  • Published:
Journal of Soils and Sediments Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Purpose

Previous research has shown that the rate at which suspended sediment is transported in watercourses depends primarily on discharge (Q) as the first-order control, but additional factors are thought to affect suspended sediment concentrations (SSC) as well. Among these, antecedent hydrological and meteorological conditions (e.g., rainfall depth and intensity, discharge prior to a runoff event and the duration of runoff events) may represent significant transport controlling mechanisms. Univariate models using Q–SSC rating curves often produce large scatter and nonlinearity, because many of the hydrological and biotic processes affecting the dynamics of sediment are non-linear and exhibit threshold behavior. The simulation of such highly non-linear processes is therefore an elusive task requiring consideration of several interrelated controlling variables. The aim of this study was to identify the major hydrological and meteorological controls determining the dynamics of SSC during storm-runoff events and the magnitude of SSC in a headwater catchment in Luxembourg.

Materials and methods

A parsimonious data-driven model (M5′ modular trees) was used to simulate SSC in response to the identified controlling variables. Antecedent hydro-meteorological variables (e.g., antecedent precipitation depths, antecedent precipitation indices, and a suit of hydrological data) were used as input variables.

Results and discussion

Twenty-four-hour antecedent runoff volumes were determined as the major control explaining sediment depletion effects during high-flow periods, and a gradual decline of SSC as a runoff event progresses. The modeling results obtained by M5′ trees were then compared to conventional power-law rating curves. The M5′ model outperformed the rating-curve by being successful in describing the shape and magnitude of the analyzed sedigraphs. Therefore, we propose that incorporating antecedent hydro-meteorological data into SSC prediction models may strongly enhance the accuracy of export coefficients. Two splitting criteria identified by the M5′ model tree (Q and antecedent runoff volume) were found and are discussed as possible thresholds responsible for the greatest nonlinearity in the Q–SSC relationship.

Conclusions

Our study highlights the dominant antecedent hydro-meteorological conditions acting as the major controls on the magnitude of SSC during episodic events in the headwater Huewelerbach catchment in Luxembourg. For future application, it would be interesting to extend and test the data-mining approach presented in this paper to other catchments, where other controls on sediment transport may be identified.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Subscribe and save

Springer+ Basic
EUR 32.99 /Month
  • Get 10 units per month
  • Download Article/Chapter or Ebook
  • 1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
  • Cancel anytime
Subscribe now

Buy Now

Price includes VAT (Canada)

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Alexandrov Y, Laronne JB, Reid I (2007) Intra-event and intra-seasonal behaviour of suspended sediment in flash floods of the semi-arid northern Negev, Israel. Geomorphology 85:85–97

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Asselman NEM (2000) Fitting and interpretation of sediment rating curves. J Hydrol 234:228–248

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bača P (2008) Hysteresis effect in suspended sediment concentration in the Rybáryk basin, Slovakia. Hydrolog Sci J 53:224–235

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bhattacharya B, Solomatine DP (2005) Neural networks and M5′ model trees in modelling water level-discharge relationship. Neurocomputing 63:381–396

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Blöschl G, Zehe E (2005) On hydrological predictibility. Hydrol Process 19:3923–3929

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bowes MJ, Williams AH, Hodgkinson RA (2003) Phosphorus dynamics along a river continuum. Sci Total Environ 313:199–212

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Bowes MJ, Smith JT, Neal C (2009) The value of high-resolution nutrient monitoring: a case study of the River Frome, Dorset, UK. J Hydrol 378:82–96

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Buck O, Niyogi DK, Townsend CR (2004) Scale-dependence of land use effects on water quality of streams in agricultural watersheds. Environ Pollut 130:287–299

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Buttle JM, Lister SW, Hill AR (2001) Controls on runoff components on a forested slope and implications for N transport. Hydrol Process 15:1065–1070

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Butturini A, Gallart F, Latron J, Vazquez E, Sabater F (2006) Cross-site comparison of variability of DOC and nitrate c-q hysteresis during the autumn–winter period in three Mediterranean headwater streams: a synthetic approach. Biogeochemistry 77:327–349

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chapman TG, Maxwell A (1996) Baseflow separation – comparison of numerical methods with tracer experiments. Institute Engineers Australia National Conference. Publ. 96/05, pp 539–545

  • Christopher SF, Mitchell MJ, McHale MR, Boyer EW, Burns DA, Kendall C (2008) Factors controlling nitrogen release from two forested catchments with contrasting hydrochemical responses. Hydrol Process 22:46–62

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Cobaner M, Unal B, Kisi O (2009) Suspended sediment concentration estimation by an adaptive neuro-fuzzy and neural network approaches using hydro-meteorological data. J Hydrol 267:52–61

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • De Sutter R, Verhoeven KA (2001) Simulation of sediment transport during flood events: laboratory work and field experiments. Hydrol Sci J 46:599–610

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Drewry JJ, Newham LTH, Croke BFW (2009) Suspended sediment, nitrogen and phosphorus concentrations and export during storm-events to the Tuross estuary, Australia. J Environ Manag 90:879–887

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Eckhardt K (2005) How to construct recursive digital filters for baseflow separation. Hydrol Process 19:507–515

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eckhardt K (2008) A comparison of baseflow indices, which were calculated with seven different baseflow separation methods. J Hydrol 352:168–173

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Evans DJ, Johnes PJ, Lawrence DS (2003) Suspended and bed load sediment transport dynamics in two lowland UK streams—storm integrated monitoring. 283, IAHS, Wallingford, UK, pp 103–110

  • Francke T, López-Tarazón JA, Schröder B (2008) Estimation of suspended sediment concentration and yield using linear models, random forests and quantile regression forests. Hydrol Process 22:4892–4904

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gerrits AMJ, Pfister L, Savenije HHG (2010) Spatial and temporal variability of canopy and forest floor interception in a beech forest. Hydrol Process 24(21):3011–3025

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hicks DM, Gomez B, Trustrum NA (2000) Erosion thresholds and suspended sediment yields, Waipaoa River Basin, New Zealand. Water Resour Res 36:1129–1142

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Horowitz AJ (2003) An evaluation of sediment rating curves for estimating suspended sediment concentrations for subsequent flux calculations. Hydrol Process 17:3387–3409

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ide J, Nagafuchi O, Chiwa M, Kume A, Otsuki K, Ogawa A (2007) Effects of discharge level on the load of dissolved and particulate components of stream nitrogen and phosphorus from a small afforested watershed of Japanese cypress (Chamaecyparis obtuse). J Forest Res 12:45–56

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Ide J, Haga H, Chiwa M, Otsuki K (2008) Effects of antecedent rain history on particulate phosphorus loss from a small forested watershed of Japanese cypress (Chamaecyparis obtuse). J Hydrol 352:322–335

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jain SK (2001) Development of integrated sediment rating curves using ANNs. J Hydraul Enging ASCE 127:30–37

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • James AL, Roulet NT (2009) Antecedent moisture conditions and catchment morphology as controls on spatial patterns of runoff generation in small forest catchments. J Hydrol 377:351–366

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Juilleret J, Iffly JF, Hoffmann L, Hissler C (2012) The potential of soil survey as a tool for surface geological map**: a case study in a hydrological experimental catchment (Huewelerbach, Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg). Geol Belg 15:36–41

    Google Scholar 

  • Kisi O, Karahan EM, Sen Z (2006) River suspended sediment modelling using a fuzzy logic approach. Hydrol Process 20:4351–4362

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Krein A, Klinck H, Eiden M, Symader W, Bierl R, Hoffmann L, Pfister L (2008) Investigating the transport dynamics and the properties of bed load material with a hydro-acoustic measuring system. Earth Surf Process Landforms 33:152–163

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lamb R, Beven KJ (1997) Using interactive recession curve analysis to specify a general catchment storage model. Hydrol Earth Syst Sci 1:101–113

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Le Bissonnais Y, Singer M (1992) Crusting, runoff and erosion response to soil water content and successive rainfalls. Soil Sci Soc Am J 56:1898–1903

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Li RH, Belford GG (2002) Instability of decision tree classification algorithms. KDD '02 Proceedings of the eighth ACM SIGKDD international conference on knowledge discovery and data mining. doi: 10.1145/775047.775131

  • López-Tarazón JA, Batalla RJ, Vericat D, Francke T (2011) The sediment budget of a highly dynamic mesoscale catchment: the River Isábena. Geomorphology 138:15–28

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Macrae ML, English MC, Schiff SL, Stone M (2010) Influence of antecedent hydrologic conditions on patterns of hydrochemical export from a first-order agricultural watershed in Southern Ontario, Canada. J Hydrol 389:101–110

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Martínez-Carreras N, Udelhoven T, Krein A, Gallart F, Iffly JF, Ziebel J, Hoffmann L, Pfister L, Walling DE (2010a) The use of sediment colour measured by diffuse reflectance spectrometry to determine sediment sources: application to the Attert River catchment (Luxembourg). J Hydrol 382:49–63

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Martínez-Carreras N, Krein A, Udelhoven T, Gallart F, Iffly JF, Hoffmann L, Pfister L, Walling DE (2010b) A rapid spectral reflectance-based fingerprinting approach for documenting suspended sediment sources during storm runoff events. J Soils Sediments 10:400–413

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Martínez-Carreras N, Krein A, Gallart F, Iffly JF, Pfister L, Owens PN (2010c) Assessment of different colour parameters for discriminating potential suspended sediment sources and provenance: a multi-scale study in Luxembourg. Geomorphology 118:118–129

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McDowell RW, Sharpley AN (2002) The effect of antecedent moisture conditions on sediment and phosphorus loss during overland flow: Mahantango Creek catchment, Pennsylvania, USA. Hydrol Process 16:3037–3050

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mianaei SJ, Keshavarzi AR (2010) Prediction of riverine suspended sediment discharge using fuzzy logic algorithms, and some implications for estuarine settings. Geo-Mar Lett 30:35–45

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nadal-Romero E, Regüés D, Latron J (2008) Relationships among rainfall, runoff, and suspended sediment in a small catchment with badlands. Catena 74:127–136

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nathan RJ, McMahan TA (1990) Evaluation of automated techniques for baseflow and recession analysis. Water Resour Res 26:1465–1473

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ollesch G, Sukhanovski Y, Kistner I, Rode M, Meissen R (2005) Characterization and modelling of the spatial heterogeneity of snowmelt erosion. Earth Surf Process Landforms 30:97–211

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Owens PN, Walling DE (2002) The phosphorus content of fluvial sediment in rural and industrialised river basins. Water Res 36:685–701

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Petticrew EL, Krein A, Walling DE (2007) Evaluating fine sediment mobilization and storage in a gravel-bed river using controlled reservoir releases. Hydrol Process 21:198–210

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Quinlan JR (1992) Learning with continuous classes. In: Adams, Sterling (eds) Proceedings AI’92. World Scientific, Singapore, pp 343–348

    Google Scholar 

  • Rusjan S, Mikoš M (2008) Assessment of hydrological and seasonal controls over the nitrate flushing from a forested watershed using a data mining technique. Hydrol Earth Syst Sci 12:645–656

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Sadeghi SHR, Mizuyama T, Miyata S, Gomi T, Kosugi K, Fukushima T, Mizugaki S, Onda Y (2008) Determinant factors of sediment graphs and rating loops in a reforested watershed. J Hydrol 356:271–282

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Schleppi P, Walder PA, Stähli M (2006) Errors of flux integration methods for solutes in grab samples of runoff water, as compared to flow-proportional sampling. J Hydrol 319:266–281

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Schreier H, Brown S (2004) Multiscale approaches to watershed management: land-use impacts on nutrient and sediment dynamics. In: Scales in Hydrology and Water Management/Echelles en Hydrologie et Gestion de l’Eau, IAHS Publ. 287, IAHS, Wallingford, UK, pp. 61–75

  • Seeger M, Errea MP, Begueria S, Arnaez J, Marti C, Garcia-Ruiz JM (2004) Catchment soil moisture and rainfall characteristics as determinant factors for discharge/suspended sediment hysteresis loops in a small headwater catchment in the Spanish Pyrenees. J Hydrol 288:299–311

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sichingabula HM (1998) Factors controlling variations in suspended sediment concentrations for single-valued sediment rating curves, Fraser River, British Columbia, Canada. Hydrol Process 12:1969–1894

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Solomatine DP, Dulal KN (2003) Model tree as an alternative to neural network in rainfall–runoff modeling. Hydrol Sci J 48:399–411

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Solomatine DP, Siek MB (2006) Modular learning models in forecasting natural phenomena. Neural Networks 19:215–224

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Solomatine DP, Maskey M, Shrestha DL (2008) Instance-based learning compared to other data-driven methods in hydrological forecasting. Hydrol Process 22:275–287

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Štravs L, Brilly M (2010) Development of a low-flow forecasting model using the M5′ machine learning method. Hydrol Sci J 52:466–477

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tayfur G (2002) Artificial neural networks for sheet sediment transport. Hydrol Sci J 47:879–892

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ternat F, Boyer P, Anselmet F, Amielh M (2008) Erosion threshold of saturated natural cohesive sediments: modeling and experiments. Water Resour Res. doi:10.1029/2007WR006537

  • van den Bos R, Iffly JF, Matgen P, Salvia M, Hoffmann L, Tosheva Z, Kies T, Pfister L (2004) Constraining conceptual rainfall-runoff responses by incorporating imprecise tracer data information into the calibration process. Proceedings of the “ERB 2004 Conference: Progress in surface and subsurface water studies at the plot and small basin scale”, pp 182–185

  • Walling DE (1977) Limitations of the rating curve technique for estimating suspended sediment loads, with particular reference to British rivers. Proceedings of the “Paris Symposium: Erosion and solid matter transport in inland waters”, IAHS Publ. 122, pp 34–48

  • Withers PJA, Jarvie HP (2008) Delivery and cycling of phosphorus in rivers: a review. Sci Total Environ 400:379–395

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Witten ICH, Frank E (2005) Data mining—practical machine learning tools and techniques. Elsevier. 2nd edition, ISBN-13:978-0-12-088407-0, pp 243–254

  • Wood PA (1977) Controls of variation in suspended sediment concentrations in the River Rother, West Sussex, England. Sedimentology 24:437–445

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zabaleta A, Martínez M, Uriarke JA, Antigüedat I (2007) Factors controlling suspended sediment yield during runoff events in small headwater catchments of the Basque Country. Catena 71:179–190

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zehe E, Sivapalan M (2009) Threshold behaviour in hydrological systems as (human) geo-ecosystems: manifestations, controls, implications. Hydrol Earth Syst Sci 13:1273–1297

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

This study was supported by the National Research Fund, Luxembourg (PDR-09-057, TR-PHD BFR07-047 and BEDLOAD C11/SR/1158445), and co-funded under the Marie Curie Actions of the European Commission (FP7-COFUND). This study could not have been conducted without the help of François Barnich (laboratory analyses) and Jean-François Iffly (field work), to whom we would like to express our gratitude.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Environment and Agro-biotechnologies, Centre de Recherche Public—Gabriel Lippmann, 41, rue du Brill, 4422, Belvaux, Luxembourg

    Milan Onderka, Andreas Krein, Sebastian Wrede, Núria Martínez-Carreras & Lucien Hoffmann

  2. Institute of Hydrology, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Račianska 75, 832 01, Bratislava, Slovakia

    Milan Onderka

  3. Water Resources Section, Faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Delft University of Technology, P.O. Box 5048, 2600, GA, Delft, The Netherlands

    Sebastian Wrede

Authors
  1. Milan Onderka
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Andreas Krein
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Sebastian Wrede
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Núria Martínez-Carreras
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Lucien Hoffmann
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Andreas Krein.

Additional information

Responsible editor: Ramon Batalla

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Onderka, M., Krein, A., Wrede, S. et al. Dynamics of storm-driven suspended sediments in a headwater catchment described by multivariable modeling. J Soils Sediments 12, 620–635 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-012-0480-6

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-012-0480-6

Keywords

Search

Navigation