Topography Impacts Hydrology in the Sub-Humid Ethiopian Highlands

Mhiret, Demesew A.; Dersseh, Minychl G.; Guzman, Christian D.; Dagnew, Dessalegn C.; Abebe, Wubneh B.; Zimale, Fasikaw A.; Zaitchik, Benjamin F.; Tilahun, Seifu A.; Walraevens, Kristine; Steenhuis, Tammo S.

doi:10.3390/w14020196

Submit to this Journal Review for this Journal Edit a Special Issue

Article Menu

...

Open AccessArticle

Topography Impacts Hydrology in the Sub-Humid Ethiopian Highlands

^1,2,*,

^1,2

⁴

⁵

⁶,

⁷

and

Tammo S. Steenhuis

^1,8,*

Faculty of Civil and Water Resources Engineering, Bahir Dar Institute of Technology, Bahir Dar University, Bahir Dar P.O. Box 26, Ethiopia

Blue Nile Water Institute, Bahir Dar University, Bahir Dar P.O. Box 79, Ethiopia

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA 01003, USA

⁴

Institute of Disaster Risk Management and Food Security Studies, Bahir Dar University, Bahir Dar P.O. Box 5501, Ethiopia

⁵

Amhara Design and Supervision Works Enterprise (ADSWE), Bahir Dar P.O. Box 1921, Ethiopia

⁶

Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA

⁷

Laboratory for Applied Geology and Hydrogeology, Ghent University, Krijgslaan 281-S8, 9000 Gent, Belgium

⁸

Department of Biological and Environmental Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14850, USA

Authors to whom correspondence should be addressed.

Academic Editors: Aizhong Ye and Karl-Erich Lindenschmidt

Water 2022, 14(2), 196; https://doi.org/10.3390/w14020196

Received: 29 October 2021 / Revised: 22 December 2021 / Accepted: 4 January 2022 / Published: 11 January 2022

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Hydrology and Sedimentology of Hilly and Mountainous Landscapes)

View Full-Text Download PDF

Browse Figures

Review Reports Citation Export

Abstract

Understanding the relationship between topography, hydrological processes, and runoff source areas is essential in engineering design, such as predicting floods and implementing effective watershed management practices. This relationship is not well defined in the highlands with a monsoon climate and needs further study. The objective of this study is to relate topographic position and hydrological response in tropical highlands. The research was conducted in the Debre Mawi watershed in the northwest sub-humid Ethiopian highlands. In the monsoon rain phase of 2017 and 2018, groundwater depth, infiltration rate, and surface runoff were monitored at the upslope, midslope, and downslope positions. Surface runoff rates were measured in farmer fields through distributed V-notch weirs as estimates of positional runoff. Average water table depths were 30 cm deep in the downslope regions and 95 cm in the upslope position. The water table depth affected the steady-state infiltration rate in the rain phase. It was high upslope (350 mm h⁻¹), low midslope (49 mm h⁻¹), and zero downslope. In 2017, the average runoff coefficients were 0.29 for the upslope and midslope and 0.73 downslope. Thus, topographic position affects all aspects of the watershed hydrology in the humid highlands and is critical in determining runoff response. View Full-Text

Keywords: Ethiopia; highlands; monsoon; distributed runoff; hydrological response; perched groundwater; infiltration; topography; watershed

▼ Show Figures

Figure 1

This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited

Supplementary Material

Externally hosted supplementary file 1
Link: https://hdl.handle.net/1813/110709
Description: Experimental data (precipitation and discharge) collected from the nine fields in the Debra Mawi watershed in 2017 and 2018

Share and Cite

MDPI and ACS Style

Mhiret, D.A.; Dersseh, M.G.; Guzman, C.D.; Dagnew, D.C.; Abebe, W.B.; Zimale, F.A.; Zaitchik, B.F.; Tilahun, S.A.; Walraevens, K.; Steenhuis, T.S. Topography Impacts Hydrology in the Sub-Humid Ethiopian Highlands. Water 2022, 14, 196. https://doi.org/10.3390/w14020196

AMA Style

Mhiret DA, Dersseh MG, Guzman CD, Dagnew DC, Abebe WB, Zimale FA, Zaitchik BF, Tilahun SA, Walraevens K, Steenhuis TS. Topography Impacts Hydrology in the Sub-Humid Ethiopian Highlands. Water. 2022; 14(2):196. https://doi.org/10.3390/w14020196

Chicago/Turabian Style

Mhiret, Demesew A., Minychl G. Dersseh, Christian D. Guzman, Dessalegn C. Dagnew, Wubneh B. Abebe, Fasikaw A. Zimale, Benjamin F. Zaitchik, Seifu A. Tilahun, Kristine Walraevens, and Tammo S. Steenhuis. 2022. "Topography Impacts Hydrology in the Sub-Humid Ethiopian Highlands" Water 14, no. 2: 196. https://doi.org/10.3390/w14020196

Find Other Styles

Note that from the first issue of 2016, MDPI journals use article numbers instead of page numbers. See further details here.

Article Metrics

Abstract views Pdf views Html views

Article Menu

Topography Impacts Hydrology in the Sub-Humid Ethiopian Highlands

Abstract

Supplementary Material

Share and Cite

Article Metrics

Article Access Statistics

Article Access Map by Country/Region

Further Information

Guidelines

MDPI Initiatives

Follow MDPI