Hydro-Morphometric Characters of Watershed Heshkaro River in Duhok City, Kurdistan Region, Northern Iraq Using Geospatial Techniques

Abstract

Hydro-Morphometric analysis of the drainage systems is an efficient tool to manage water resources to protect from flooding or discover suitable locations for hydrological projects. This study aims to analyze the morphological and hydrologic processes of the Heshkaro River watershed using Remote Sensing and Geographic Information System techniques. The river causes damage to neighborhoods, which are located at the mouth during the rainy season. The ALOS PALSAR digital elevation model (12.5 m resolution) data and ArcGIS 10.8 toolbox were used to delineate the watershed and calculate the morphometric characteristics of the river drainage. The results show that the Heshkaro River basin is a fifth-order basin with 359 tributaries and a total length reached 214.13 km, where there is a strong exponential relationship (R2 =0.97) between the mean length of streams and stream order. In addition, the study area is an elongated shape, depending on the elongation and circularity ratio. Furthermore, the bifurcation ratio, basin relief, and slope degree indicate that the geological structure has little influence on the drainage pattern. The basin has low runoff, low relief, and high infiltration, as well as low exposure to erosion and sediment loading. The results of this study provide the requirement for deep management of the Heshkaro River watershed to secure the environmental sustainability of the basin.