Study on rainfall, runoff, and sediment characteristics and their relationships of flood events in typical small watersheds of Dabie Mountain area, western Anhui Province
1.Hydrology Bureau of Anhui Province,Hefei 230022,China
2.Jiangsu Provincial Key Laboratory of Soil and Water Conservation and Ecological Restoration,Co-Innovation;Center of Sustainable Forestry in Southern China,Forestry College of Nanjing Forestry University,Nanjing 210037,China
Objective Flood events are the key driving process of runoff and sediment yield in watersheds. Revealing their rainfall, runoff, and sediment dynamic characteristics and relationships is of great significance for understanding sediment transport in small watersheds in mountainous area. Methods The small watershed in the Jiangzi River in the Dabie Mountain area of western Anhui Province was selected as the study area. Based on the analysis of rainfall, runoff, and sediment characteristics, redundancy analysis (RDA) and multiple stepwise regression were used to investigate the relationships between rainfall, runoff, and sediment. Additionally, the lag effect of sediment transport in the small watershed was revealed through hysteresis analysis. Results (1) 94.55% of flood events occurred between March and September, with the maximum rainfall, runoff, and sediment concentration observed in July. During the flood events, the runoff was 4.8 times the annual average, and the sediment yield modulus accounted for more than 90% of the annual total. Flood events with a sediment yield modulus exceeding 50 t/km2, which accounted for only 5.5% of all events, contributed 71.2% of the total sediment yield. (2) Runoff was the primary influencing factor of sediment yield, explaining 89.7% of the variance (p<0.001). Rainfall amount and maximum 30-minute rainfall intensity individually affected runoff and sediment concentration, but the combined rainfall-runoff indicator demonstrated greater explanatory power (R2=0.61) for the sediment yield compared to single indicators. The relationship between runoff and sediment was particularly strong. (3) Flood events under different hysteresis models showed significant differences in sediment transport processes. The clockwise hysteresis model, which accounted for the highest proportion (45.87%), showed significantly higher rainfall erosivity and runoff compared to other models. The counterclockwise model exhibited the highest sediment yield modulus, while the complex model exhibited the highest rainfall and runoff. Conclusion Under heavy rainfall conditions, the rapid sediment response is the primary form of watershed erosion, with sediment sources mainly distributed in the middle and lower reaches of channels in small watersheds.
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