Articles | Volume 27, issue 15
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2883-2023
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2883-2023
Research article
 | 
02 Aug 2023
Research article |  | 02 Aug 2023

Isotope-derived young water fractions in streamflow across the tropical Andes mountains and Amazon floodplain

Emily I. Burt, Daxs Herson Coayla Rimachi, Adan Julian Ccahuana Quispe, Abra Atwood, and A. Joshua West

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The seasonal origins and ages of water provisioning streams and trees in a tropical montane cloud forest
Emily I. Burt, Gregory R. Goldsmith, Roxanne M. Cruz-de Hoyos, Adan Julian Ccahuana Quispe, and A. Joshua West
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 4173–4186, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-4173-2023,https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-4173-2023, 2023
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Cited articles

Allen, S. T., Kirchner, J. W., Braun, S., Siegwolf, R. T. W., and Goldsmith, G. R.: Seasonal origins of soil water used by trees, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 23, 1199–1210, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-1199-2019, 2019. 
Ameli, A. A., Beven, K., Erlandsson, M., Creed, I. F., McDonnell, J. J., and Bishop, K.: Primary weathering rates, water transit times, and concentration-discharge relations: A theoretical analysis for the critical zone: Weathering Rate, Permeability, Stream C-Q, Water Resour. Res., 53, 942–960, https://doi.org/10.1002/2016WR019448, 2017. 
Asano, Y. and Uchida, T.: Flow path depth is the main controller of mean base flow transit times in a mountainous catchment: Flow Path Depth Controls Transit Times, Water Resour. Res., 48, W03512, https://doi.org/10.1029/2011WR010906, 2012. 
Atwood, A. and West, A. J.: Evaluation of high-resolution DEMs from satellite imagery for geomorphic applications: A case study using the SETSM algorithm, Earth Surf. Proc. Land., 47, 706–722, https://doi.org/10.1002/esp.5263, 2022. 
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Short summary
Mountains store and release water, serving as water towers for downstream regions and affecting global sediment and carbon fluxes. We use stream and rain chemistry to calculate how much streamflow comes from recent rainfall across seven sites in the Andes mountains and the nearby Amazon lowlands. We find that the type of rock and the intensity of rainfall control water retention and release, challenging assumptions that mountain topography exerts the primary effect on watershed hydrology.
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