Hillslope and groundwater contributions to streamflow  in a Rocky Mountain watershed underlain by glacial  till and fractured sedimentary bedrock

Spencer, Sheena A.; Anderson, Axel E.; Silins, Uldis; Collins, Adrian L.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-237-2021

Articles | Volume 25, issue 1

https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-237-2021

© Author(s) 2021. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-237-2021

© Author(s) 2021. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 25, issue 1

Research article

|

15 Jan 2021

Research article |

| 15 Jan 2021

Hillslope and groundwater contributions to streamflow in a Rocky Mountain watershed underlain by glacial till and fractured sedimentary bedrock

Sheena A. Spencer, Axel E. Anderson, Uldis Silins, and Adrian L. Collins

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Final revised paper (published on 15 Jan 2021)
Preprint (discussion started on 16 Mar 2020)

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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- Supplement

RC1: 'Review of the manuscript ‘Seasonally varied hillslope and groundwater contributions to streamflow in a glacial till and fractured sedimentary bedrock dominated Rocky Mountain watershed’ by Spencer et al.', Anonymous Referee #1, 13 Apr 2020
- AC1: 'Response to comments by Referee #1', Sheena Spencer, 12 May 2020
  - EC1: 'Editor comment (need for a more detailed response to main critics)', Bettina Schaefli, 14 May 2020
    - AC3: 'Response to Editor comment', Sheena Spencer, 19 May 2020
RC2: 'Reviewer comments', Anonymous Referee #2, 05 May 2020
- AC2: 'Response to comments by Referee #2', Sheena Spencer, 12 May 2020
RC3: 'Reviewer 3 comments', Anonymous Referee #3, 08 Jun 2020
- AC4: 'Response to comments by Referee #3', Sheena Spencer, 29 Jun 2020

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

ED: Reconsider after major revisions (further review by editor and referees) (08 Jul 2020) by Bettina Schaefli

AR by Sheena Spencer on behalf of the Authors (26 Aug 2020) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (01 Sep 2020) by Bettina Schaefli

RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (22 Oct 2020)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

General comment
The manuscript has been substantially revised, implementing my comments and the ones by the other reviewers, and I believe that this extra work by the authors has significantly improved the manuscript.
I have only a few minor comments listed below.

Minor comments and technical corrections
10. Inferences on what? Please specify.

44. Give examples and references.

72. I’m not a native speaker but I think that “have” should be “has”.

178. Can you include one/two more recent references here? I’m sure there are some.

201-205. Are seeps mostly active during snowmelt or after rainy events? Do they reflect stream dynamics or their discharge is relatively stable through the snow-free period? I think that a slightly more detailed discussion on the representativeness of these seeps is important to corroborate the results.

240-246. I appreciate that this part has been considered and included in this version of the manuscript. However, I suggest considering moving these lines in the Discussion and focus here more on what you have done that on what you have not done and why. This will streamline this section avoiding pre-introducing, without really explaining, methods such as TVR and LDA.

252-255. This is a weird way to report an equation. Please, write in in mathematical terms.

287. Please add the p-value.

338. I suggest replacing “separation” with “difference”.

351 but also 404 and 422. These titles are identical and potentially confusing. Please, elaborate them better putting them in the context of each section.

373 (caption of Fig. 4). “R” should be “r” (also for consistency with line 287).

Table 2. I suggest including average discharge with its standard deviation for both years and both subcatchments.

457. CV of which parameter? Please, specify.

Fig. 12. Use more contrasting colours for the symbols.

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ED: Publish subject to technical corrections (25 Nov 2020) by Bettina Schaefli

AR by Sheena Spencer on behalf of the Authors (30 Nov 2020) Author's response Manuscript

Short summary

We used unique chemical signatures of precipitation, hillslope soil water, and groundwater sources of streamflow to explore seasonal variation in runoff generation in a snow-dominated mountain watershed underlain by glacial till and permeable bedrock. Reacted hillslope water reached the stream first at the onset of snowmelt, followed by a dilution effect by snowmelt from May to June. Groundwater and riparian water were important sources later in the summer. Till created complex subsurface flow.