Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Description of the study area
The research area is located on the southern slope of
Volcán Lonquimay within the Reserva Forestal Malalca-
huello ( Figure 11.44 ). The catchment has a size of 6.26
km², ranges in elevation from 1120 to 1856 m, with mean
slopes of 51% ( Figure 11.45 ). Almost 80% of the catch-
ment is covered with native forest of the types Araucaria
and Nothofagus with a dense under-storey of bamboo
(Chusquea culeou)( Figure 11.46a and b). The climate
is temperate-humid with yearly rainfall ranging from
2000 mm/yr to over 3000 mm/yr. The soils are young
little-developed volcanic ash soils with extremely high
porosities (60
-
80%) and high hydraulic conductivities
(10 -5
10 -3 m/s). The study reported here was carried out
from December 2003 to May 2006 and included several
1 to 2 month long field campaigns. Existing data prior to
this study included data from two nearby climate stations
where data were measured, (i) on a daily basis since 1989,
and (ii) on an hourly basis since 1999. A stream gauging
station (maintained by the Universidad Austral) at the main
outlet of the catchment was under intermittent operation
from 1998.
-
Methods
While remote sensing data can give us the
,
i.e., large-scale information with usually coarse temporal
resolution, this information is not of much use for process
studies in small catchments, where the spatial extent is
small and processes happen very fast. In this case we were
also not able to transfer data and process knowledge from
neighbouring larger catchments with longer time series of
data as these catchments are more impacted by anthropo-
genic intervention, an effect we specifically wanted to
exclude. Thus, a mixed approach of experimental work
and modelling seemed to be the most promising (see
Chapters 3 and 4 ).
Going into this study we were faced with many limi-
tations: time, money, prior data and even accessibility of
'
big picture
'
Figure 11.44. Aerial view of the region. Photo from www.sinia.cl ,
Sistema Nacional de Información Ambiental.
Figure 11.45. Catchment overview and focus area. From Blume et al.( 2008a ).
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