Articles | Volume 25, issue 12
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-6333-2021
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-6333-2021
Comment/reply
 | 
14 Dec 2021
Comment/reply |  | 14 Dec 2021

Comment on “A comparison of catchment travel times and storage deduced from deuterium and tritium tracers using StorAge Selection functions” by Rodriguez et al. (2021)

Michael Kilgour Stewart, Uwe Morgenstern, and Ian Cartwright

Related authors

Short high-accuracy tritium data time series for assessing groundwater mean transit times in the vadose and saturated zones of the Luxembourg Sandstone aquifer
Laurent Gourdol, Michael K. Stewart, Uwe Morgenstern, and Laurent Pfister
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3519–3547, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3519-2024,https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3519-2024, 2024
Short summary
Irrigation return flow causing a nitrate hotspot and denitrification imprints in groundwater at Tinwald, New Zealand
Michael Kilgour Stewart and Philippa Lauren Aitchison-Earl
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 3583–3601, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-3583-2020,https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-3583-2020, 2020
Short summary
Aggregation effects on tritium-based mean transit times and young water fractions in spatially heterogeneous catchments and groundwater systems
Michael K. Stewart, Uwe Morgenstern, Maksym A. Gusyev, and Piotr Małoszewski
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 21, 4615–4627, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-4615-2017,https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-4615-2017, 2017
Short summary
Application of tritium in precipitation and baseflow in Japan: a case study of groundwater transit times and storage in Hokkaido watersheds
Maksym A. Gusyev, Uwe Morgenstern, Michael K. Stewart, Yusuke Yamazaki, Kazuhisa Kashiwaya, Terumasa Nishihara, Daisuke Kuribayashi, Hisaya Sawano, and Yoichi Iwami
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 20, 3043–3058, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-3043-2016,https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-3043-2016, 2016
Short summary
Time series of tritium, stable isotopes and chloride reveal short-term variations in groundwater contribution to a stream
C. Duvert, M. K. Stewart, D. I. Cendón, and M. Raiber
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 20, 257–277, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-257-2016,https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-257-2016, 2016
Short summary

Related subject area

Subject: Catchment hydrology | Techniques and Approaches: Instruments and observation techniques
Exploring the provenance of information across Canadian hydrometric stations: implications for discharge estimation and uncertainty quantification
Shervan Gharari, Paul H. Whitfield, Alain Pietroniro, Jim Freer, Hongli Liu, and Martyn P. Clark
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4383–4405, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4383-2024,https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4383-2024, 2024
Short summary
Using high-frequency solute synchronies to determine simple two-end-member mixing in catchments during storm events
Nicolai Brekenfeld, Solenn Cotel, Mikaël Faucheux, Paul Floury, Colin Fourtet, Jérôme Gaillardet, Sophie Guillon, Yannick Hamon, Hocine Henine, Patrice Petitjean, Anne-Catherine Pierson-Wickmann, Marie-Claire Pierret, and Ophélie Fovet
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4309–4329, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4309-2024,https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4309-2024, 2024
Short summary
Thermal regime of High Arctic tundra ponds, Nanuit Itillinga (Polar Bear Pass), Nunavut, Canada
Kathy L. Young and Laura C. Brown
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3931–3945, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3931-2024,https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3931-2024, 2024
Short summary
Impacts of hydrofacies geometry designed from seismic refraction tomography on estimated hydrogeophysical variables
Nolwenn Lesparre, Sylvain Pasquet, and Philippe Ackerer
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 873–897, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-873-2024,https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-873-2024, 2024
Short summary
Seasonal dynamics and spatial patterns of soil moisture in a loess catchment
Shaozhen Liu, Ilja van Meerveld, Yali Zhao, Yunqiang Wang, and James W. Kirchner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 205–216, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-205-2024,https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-205-2024, 2024
Short summary

Cited articles

Benettin, P., Soulsby, C., Birkel, C., Tetzlaff, D., Botter, G., and Rinaldo, A.: Using SAS functions and high-resolution isotope data to unravel travel time distributions in headwater catchments, Water Resour. Res., 53, 1864–1878, https://doi.org/10.1002/2016WR020117, 2017. 
Botter, G., Bertuzzo, E., and Rinaldo, A.: Catchment residence and travel time distributions: The master equation, Geophys. Res. Lett., 38, L11403, https://doi.org/10.1029/2011GL047666, 2011. 
Cartwright, I., Morgenstern, U., Howcroft, W., Hofmann, H., Armit, R., Stewart, M., Burton, C., and Irvine, D.: The variation and controls of mean transit times in Australian headwater catchments, Hydrol. Process., 34, 4034–4048, https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.13862, 2020. 
Cartwright, I., Irvine, D., Burton, C., and Uwe Morgenstern, U.: Assessing the controls and uncertainties on mean transit times in contrasting headwater catchments, J. Hydrol., 557, 16–29, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2017.12.007, 2018. 
Dinçer, T., Payne, B. R., Florkowski, T., Martinec, J., and Tongiorgi, E.: Snowmelt runoff from measurements of tritium and oxygen-18, Water Resour. Res., 6, 110–124, 1970. 
Short summary
The combined use of deuterium and tritium to determine travel time distributions in streams is an important development in catchment hydrology (Rodriguez et al., 2021). This comment, however, argues that their results do not generally invalidate the truncation hypothesis of Stewart et al. (2010) (i.e. that stable isotopes underestimate travel times through catchments), as they imply, but asserts instead that the hypothesis still applies to many other catchments.