This paper presents findings from a 1-month field experiment conducted during the flood season of 2000 on the southern coast of Taiwan to examine the delivery of lithogenic (siliciclastic) sediment to Kao-ping Submarine Canyon from the nearby Kao-ping River and shelf sources and the transport of suspended lithogenic and nonlithogenic particles near the canyon floor. Collected time series data included simultaneous measurements of coastal winds, salinity, temperature, flow field, suspended sediment concentration (SSC) and size composition of suspended particles at the river mouth and inside the submarine canyon, as well as results from seawater and sediment trap data. Other collected data included river discharge and sediment load and hydrographic measurements along and across the axis of the canyon. During the experiment, two significant episodic river sediment discharge events occurred relating to a typhoon and extreme precipitation conditions.The findings show that theoretically, the time difference between sand and clay siliciclastic grains to settle from the sea surface to the canyon floor is on the order of hours to months, analogous to a sorting process. River plume dynamics and the coastal wind field largely control the delivery of terrigenous fine-grained sediment to the canyon. Inside the canyon, the ‘behavior’ of suspended lithogenic and nonlithogenic particles of different sizes can be differentiated into a coarse-grained group (sand), which forms the ‘drop-in’ population; and a fine-grained group (mud), which forms the ‘standing’ population. Each group has distinct spectral characteristics. The coarse-grained group is delivered directly to the canyon by the river effluent, and by wave resuspension of the shelf substrate. During the study period, the net transport of suspended particles near the canyon floor was landward mostly by tidal currents, whose direction was also modulated by spring/neap tide. Both lithogenic and nonlithogenic particles contribute to high mass fluxes (exceeding 700 g m−2 day−1) in the lower part of the canyon.This river–sea system represents a type of systems that consist of three geographically separated dynamic entities: the river plume, the shelf, and the canyon. Under fair-weather conditions, the river plume and shelf processes are coupled through the tide and wind field. The river and canyon form a direct source-to-sink link via coarse-grained siliciclastic sediment during the flood season in both continuous and pulsed fashion. In the typhoon season, the shelf becomes a pulsed source region for coarse-grained sediment.