Malihe Ebrahimi; Hossein Asadi; Arezoo Sharifi; Eisa Ebrahimi
Abstract
Introduction: The study of physical properties of suspended sediments is one of the main topics in river studies. Sediment size distribution is one of the sediment physical properties which indicate the relation between the sediment source and its sedimentation process in watersheds. It is also important ...
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Introduction: The study of physical properties of suspended sediments is one of the main topics in river studies. Sediment size distribution is one of the sediment physical properties which indicate the relation between the sediment source and its sedimentation process in watersheds. It is also important for prediction of the load of non-point source pollution, and for planning sediment trap structures. The Anzali Wetland, located on the southern coast of the Caspian Sea in northern Iran, is a large complex of freshwater lagoons with extensive reed-beds, shallow impoundments and seasonal flooded meadows. Environmental conditions in the Anzali Wetland have been degraded due to the increased inflow of sewerage, wastewater and solid waste from the industry, agriculture and urban area, and sediment from the upper stream mountainous area. The lagoon has decreased in size since the 1930s to less than a quarter of its former extent. The aim of the present study was to assess the changes in size distribution of suspended sediment in Pasikhan River as the most important river interring to Anzali Wetland.
Material and Methods: Pasikhan River originates from the South Mountains, has two branches namely Siahmezgi and Imamzadeh Ebrahim. The sampling carried out during a seven month time period (October 2013 to April 2014) at two hydrometric stations; Mobarakabad (upstream) and Nokhaleh (downstream). The samples were collected in 15 days intervals by depth-integration technique at normal condition. Particle size distribution was measured by Pipette method based on Stocks law. The mean weight diameter (MWD) of sediment particles was calculated, the sediment size distribution curve was drawn and the median grain size (d50) was calculated. According to the European classification, the particles size distribution was divided into four groups of fine sand (0.2 mm), coarse silts (0.06 mm), medium silt (0.02 mm), and fine silt and clay (equal to and less than 0.006 mm). The data were compared for each sampling time for both Stations. Flow discharge and suspended sediment load were also determined at each sampling date.
Results and Discussion: At the Nokhaleh station, the maximum observed flow discharge and sediment concentration were 51.4 m3/s and 4.162 g/L, occurred in February 4, 2014 and November 3, 2013, respectively. The highest flow discharge and sediment concentration of the Mobarakabad were 9.8 m3/s and 2.633 g/L which were observed on February 19, 2014 and April 4, 2014, respectively. These changes and differences were partly due to topography and land use differences between upland and lowland and partly due to rainfall pattern. Results showed that the MWD and d50 were 0.062 and 0.052 mm on average, respectively at Mobarakabad station, and 0.055 and 0.051 mm, respectively at Nowkhaleh station. The maximum values of MWD and d50 were observed to be 0.07 and 0.061 mm, respectively at normal condition at Mobarakabad station. The study of sediment size distribution indicated that the particles smaller than 2 mm comprised 83-94 percent of the suspended sediment at Mobarakabad station, and 87-99 percent at Nokhaleh station. The percentage of particles smaller than 0.02 mm were observed to be 12-33 and 10-64 at Mobarakabad and Noukhaleh stations, respectively. Also the amount of fine silt and clay in suspended sediment were 3-16 and 5-24 percent at these stations. There was not any correlation between flow discharge and sediment concentration or sediment size distribution characteristics.
Conclusion: In most of the samples, there was not any relationship between the flow discharge and particle size distribution of suspended sediment which emphasize on the non-hydraulic nature of sediment transport and the effects of different factors including sediment sources, the season, transport energy, rainfall erosivity, soil erodibility and deposition process. Generally, the size of sediment particles at Mobarakabad station was coarser than Nokhaleh station. This could be due to the type of soil erosion which is different at upstream and downstream. In upstream regions, mainly because of severity of topography and vegetation cover including forest and rangeland, the occurrence of gully erosion and landslide is higher in comparison with surface soil erosion. But in downstream especially in paddy fields, the soil erosion type is mainly splash and sheet erosion. Also the cultivation practices including plowing and paddling of the field usually provides fine particles entering to the river. In addition, the river profile is very gentle at the plain before the Nokhaleh station which resulted in deposition of coarser particles.
M.R. Khaledian; S.A. Moussavi; H. Asadi; M. Norouzi; M. Aligoli
Abstract
Introduction: With increasing awareness of human beings towards the environment, researchers pay more attention to process and redistribution of water flow and solute transport in the soil and groundwater. Moreover, determination of soil hydraulic conductivity is necessary to determine the runoff from ...
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Introduction: With increasing awareness of human beings towards the environment, researchers pay more attention to process and redistribution of water flow and solute transport in the soil and groundwater. Moreover, determination of soil hydraulic conductivity is necessary to determine the runoff from basins. Water movement within the unsaturated zone is often described by the formulae proposed by Richards. To solve this equation, initial and boundary conditions of the hydraulic conductivity and the soil water pressure should be determined as functions of soil water content. Beerkan method was developed to identify retention and hydraulic conductivity curves. In this method, van Gunechten with Burdine condition and Brooks and Corey equations were used to describe water retention and hydraulic conductivity curves. Recognition of the spatial pattern of studied parameter using semivariogram and then preparing zoning map with interpolation methods such as IDW and kriging can help us in relevant watershed management. The aim of this study was to spatial analyze of saturated hydraulic conductivity from 50 infiltration tests at watershed scale using Beerkan method and then preparing zoning map for the Navroud watershed.
Materials and Methods: Navroud-Assalem watershed with an area of about 307 km2 is located in the west part of Guilan province, within the city of Talesh. Of the total watershed area of Navroud, about 41 km2 is plains and the rest of it is about 266 km2, corresponding to the mountainous area. The study area includes an area with a height above 130 m. In order to complete the database of the studied watershed the present study was designed to assess soil saturated hydraulic conductivity. In this study, a 2×2 km network was designed in Navroud watershed with a surface area of 307 km2, and then infiltration tests were carried out in each node using single ring of Beerkan. Beerkan method derives shape parameters from particle-size distribution and normalization parameters from infiltration test with a near zero pressure head. Evaluation of spatial variation was done using GS+ and zoning map was prepared with ArcGIS software. Statistical evaluation of recorded data was done using SPSS software package.
Results and Discussion: Results showed that the soil bulk density was of 1.07 gr cm-3 in average. Furthermore, the results showed that the average of saturated hydraulic conductivity (Ks) in the watershed was of 3.96 cm hr-1 with a coefficient of variation of 151%. The watershed Ks is classified in the moderate class. Regarding the high value of Ks variation coefficient, using geostatistics is necessary to analyze Ks spatial variation. The results indicate the absence of the anisotropy. Using GS+ software, exponential model was fit on the empirical variation (r2=0.953 and RSS=0.0057 cm hr-1). The effective range was of 2280 m. The difference between the amounts reported by other studies and this study was because of the effect of the difference in the study area (307 km, in this study), scale (the field or watershed) and the distance between measured points. Two usual methods of interpolation including inverse distance weighting and ordinal kriging were verified. The results showed that ordinal kriging performed better than inverse distance weighting method (RMSEs for ordinal kriging and inverse distance weighting were 8.97 and 9.75, respectively). Zoning map of Ks was prepared according to the results of GS+ software using ArcGIS software. The correlation coefficients between Ks and sand, silt and clay percents were -0.04, 0.01 and 0.07, which demonstrate a weak effect of soil texture on the Ks as compared with soil structure. The correlation coefficient of the soil bulk density with Ks was of -0.45 which demonstrate a stronger effect as compared with the soil texture.
Conclusions: The results of this study can be used to proper management of watersheds. One of the main information needed to manage a watershed is Ks. Determining the spatial variability of soil saturated hydraulic conductivity at watershed scale in spite of its difficulty is one of the main prerequisite parameters to provide detailed maps of a watershed. The aim of this study was to analyze the spatial variability of Ks in Navroud-Assalem watershed, Guilan province. After analyzing spatial data, using ordinary kriging interpolation method, zoning map of Ks was prepared. This map can be used to find the optimal management of watershed, such as determining the amount of basin runoff and groundwater recharge.
