Hydrometeorological field instrumentation in Lesser Himalaya to advance research for future water and food security.

Abstract

Hydrometeorological monitoring and continuous data collection in ungauged mountainous regions are exciting and challenging for water resource planners compared to the measurement in plain areas. Lesser Himalayas in the mountainous areas face the insufficiency of continuous hydrometeorological data, hindering our understanding of hydrological processes and hampering integrated water resources management. This present study focuses on the setup of the field instruments for collecting hydrometeorological data and analyzing continuously collected data at Aglar watershed to assess hydrometeorological parameters' spatial and temporal distribution. The instrumentation includes monitoring one sub-surface flow, five stream flows, four rain gauges, and one automatic weather station. The relationship between the stage and the discharge was established based on the collected data for three streams. The analyzed seasonal rainfall revealed 726.7 mm of rain occurred during the monsoon with an intensity of less than 16 mm/day. The Paligaad sub-watershed displayed a flashy response towards the rainfall events, whereas the Upper Aglar exhibited a wide range of dampening runoff responses for different rainfall events. The monitored sub-surface flow varies annually, and during the monsoon season, interflow and baseflow hydrograph decayed more rapidly at the rate of 0.04 day-1 and 0.78 day-1, respectively. The installed AWS has been used to measure crop water requirements and plan for better strategies to cope with future food and water security. The high-frequency generated data will help answer the queries related to hydrological responses of different watershed characteristics.