Sediment-Loading Processes in a Forested Catchment: Modeling and Observations

Abstract

In order to investigate sediment-loading processes in a catchment, the daily time series of river discharge and sediment load were applied to a semi-distributed model, the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT). The time series of discharge and sediment load were obtained by monitoring the river stage and water turbidity of the Oikamanai River, Hokkaido, Japan, in the rainfall season (April-November) of 2011-2014. The catchment is forested (ca 90% area) but underlain by the Neogene sedimentary rocks with currently active faults and forest soils with tephra layers, which tend to frequently produce slope failure such as landslide and bank collapse by rainfall or snowmelt. The water turbidity, T, in ppm was converted into suspended sediment concentration, SSC, in g/L by applying the linear relationship between T and SSC. The acquisition of the time series of discharge, Q (m3/s) and sediment load, L (=Q·SSC in g/s) of the river allowed us to distinguish the fluvial sediment transport, accompanied by slope failure in the upstream, from that under no slope failure. The SWAT was used to simulate soil erosion and identify the region prone to the soil erosion in the Oikamanai River basin. The model’s results showed a satisfactory agreement between daily observed and simulated sediment load as indicated by the high Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency. This evidences that the upper mountainous region of the catchment provides a main sediment source, accompanied by slope failure.