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Hydrological response of a headwater catchment in southeastern Brazil Part I: Patterns of rainfall-runoff and stormflow
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  • Mariane Chittolina,
  • Leonardo Dominques,
  • Gré de Araújo Lobo,
  • Humberto Rocha
Mariane Chittolina
Universidade de Sao Paulo Instituto de Energia e Ambiente

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Leonardo Dominques
Universidade de Sao Paulo Instituto de Astronomia Geofisica e Ciencias Atmosfericas
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Gré de Araújo Lobo
Departamento de Águas e Energia Elétrica – Centro Tecnológico de Hidráulica e Recursos Hídricos (DAEE-CTH) Professor Lúcio Martins Rodrigues Avenue 120 CEP 05508-020 University City - São Paulo – SP
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Humberto Rocha
Universidade de Sao Paulo Instituto de Energia e Ambiente
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Abstract

Headwater basins are central for meeting water management and, in humid tropical areas, essential to understand the baseflow, the discharge component that maintains water availability during the dry season, and the stormflow generated from recurrent convective clouds that can lead to flash floods. We measured field data in a typical headwater basin and four sub-basins, in subtropical climate region of Serra da Mantiqueira/South-East Brazil, with a multi-instrument hydrometeorological set (precipitation, streamflow, baseflow, stormflow, soil moisture SM, water table depth WTD), towards providing regional data, to our knowledge, hitherto non-existent, on hydrological response patterns, and variation of stormflow generation with boundary conditions and scale. Precipitation recovered in September and peaked in January concurrently with streamflow. Baseflow responded for most of the streamflow during the dry season and about half in the wettest months, and peaked ahead in March, highly covariated with WTD. In contrast, SM described a longer yearly memory, that recovered 3 months earlier than streamflow, and depleted 2 months latter in March. The monthly scale stormflow responded significantly to rainfall although with low predictability. At the event scale, revealling patterns for all basins showed thresholds of precipitation (≃ 10 mm), SM (≃45% to 57%) and WTD ≃135 cm, below which stormflow was modest. The event stormflow coeficient (eSC) reached up a maximum of 25%, albeit with large variance and little seasonality of the median. Estimates of eSC with double mass and SM thresholds showed pronounced spatial and temporal differences (3.2 to 9.6% in drier conditions and 7.7 to 15.4% wetter conditions). Mean streamflow and runoff coefficient were quite lower at the main basin (21% compared to about ≃32% between sub-basins), where there possibly exists groundwater flux exportation, that discharge on a larger spatial scale, by water exiting the basin without passing through the surface outlet.
01 Mar 2022Submitted to Hydrological Processes
01 Mar 2022Submission Checks Completed
01 Mar 2022Assigned to Editor
01 Mar 2022Reviewer(s) Assigned
02 Mar 2022Review(s) Completed, Editorial Evaluation Pending
15 Apr 2022Editorial Decision: Revise Major
27 Jul 20221st Revision Received
27 Jul 2022Submission Checks Completed
27 Jul 2022Assigned to Editor
27 Jul 2022Reviewer(s) Assigned
11 Aug 2022Review(s) Completed, Editorial Evaluation Pending
18 Aug 2022Editorial Decision: Revise Major
12 Oct 20222nd Revision Received
12 Oct 2022Submission Checks Completed
12 Oct 2022Assigned to Editor
12 Oct 2022Reviewer(s) Assigned
17 Oct 2022Review(s) Completed, Editorial Evaluation Pending
19 Oct 2022Editorial Decision: Revise Major
05 Dec 20223rd Revision Received
08 Dec 2022Submission Checks Completed
08 Dec 2022Assigned to Editor
08 Dec 2022Reviewer(s) Assigned
06 Jan 2023Review(s) Completed, Editorial Evaluation Pending
09 Jan 2023Editorial Decision: Revise Major
31 Mar 20234th Revision Received
02 Apr 2023Submission Checks Completed
02 Apr 2023Assigned to Editor
02 Apr 2023Reviewer(s) Assigned
10 Apr 2023Review(s) Completed, Editorial Evaluation Pending
10 Apr 2023Editorial Decision: Accept