A framework to assess the impact of ecological water conveyance on groundwater-dependent terrestrial ecosystems in arid inland river basins

Feng, Huang; Chunyu, Xunzhou; Zhang, Danrong; Chen, Xi; Ochoa, Carlos G.

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.136155

Cited by 51 publications

(23 citation statements)

References 57 publications

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“…The vegetation restoration in the downstream is the weakest, the TR downstream has been gradually dried up since the 1970s [49], consequently, the downstream underwent a long process of ecological degradation, including groundwater decline, death of natural vegetation, salinization, and desertification [50]. The implementation of ecological water conveyance project along the lower reaches of the TR has led to a slow recovery of the vegetation coverage [51][52][53], although the gradual process of vegetation restoration in TR still takes time. It proved that the water transports are the realistic index for identifying change in vegetation growth in the TR downstream [48,50,54].…”

Section: Vegetation Dynamics and Its Response To The Hydrological Sitmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing Vegetation Dynamics and Landscape Ecological Risk on the Mainstream of Tarim River, China

Hui

Xue

Wei³

et al. 2020

Water

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The Tarim River (TR), the longest inland river at an arid area in China, plays a critical role in the sustainable development of the regional ecological environment. This study presents the spatial-temporal variations in the vegetation coverage at regional and pixel scales and its driving factors on the TR mainstream. The latest dataset of normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and a vegetation coverage index (fc) over the period from 2000–2015 were analyzed with the unary linear regression and the partial correlation. On the basis of land use data, we further built the landscape ecological risk index and assessed the ecological risk level of the mainstream. Our results suggest that the vegetation coverage index demonstrated fluctuations but denoted a generally upward trend in the TR mainstream, the vegetation improvement areas are far greater than the degraded areas during the study period. Apparently, the overflow days in the TR mainstream and the cumulative amount of water transport are the two main factors that dominate the vegetation coverage. The ecological risk level varies throughout the TR with a high-to-low spatial distribution from upstream to downstream, and the overall landscape ecological risk of the whole basin exhibits an upward tendency. Above all, our study provides a framework with the remote sensing data to assess vegetation coverage and landscape ecological risk which can help design and implement reliable strategies for the ecological management and vegetation restoration in the Tarim River Basin.

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Section: Vegetation Dynamics and Its Response To The Hydrological Sitmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing Vegetation Dynamics and Landscape Ecological Risk on the Mainstream of Tarim River, China

Hui

Xue

Wei³

et al. 2020

Water

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“…However, ecological reversal to the natural status is a long-term dynamic change process [12]. People are working to accelerate the restoration of the ecosystem through manual intervention, and ecological water transportation to ecologically fragile areas is one of the most important methods to achieve this [13,14]. In northwest China, this measure has been employed to maintain the ecological system balance of downstream waters, especially for wetland vegetation systems.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Similarly, a total of 4.512 billion m 3 of water was transferred to the downstream area in the Heihe River Basin from 2000 to 2008, which led to extensive vegetation restoration [16]. Maintaining the ecosystem in downstream waters through ecological water transportation has become the focus of ecological research of arid areas throughout the world [13,14]. Due to the demand for water resources in the upper and middle reaches of these arid river basins in spring and summer for agriculture, little water tends to be available to transfer downstream.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Effect of Water Transfer during Non-growing Season on the Wetland Ecosystem via Surface and Groundwater Interactions in Arid Northwestern China

Qiao

Sun

et al. 2020

Remote Sensing

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The use of ecological water transfer to maintain the ecological environment in arid or semiarid regions has become an important means of human intervention to alleviate vegetation ecosystem degradation in arid and semiarid areas. The water transfer to downstream in a catchment is often carried out during the non-growing season, due to the competitive water use between the upper and middle reaches and lower reaches of rivers. However, the impacts and mechanism of artificial water transfer on vegetation and wetland ecosystem restoration have not been thoroughly investigated, especially in northwest China. Taking the Qingtu Lake wetland system in the lower reaches of the Shiyang River Catchment as the study area, this study analyzed the spatial and temporal distribution surface area of Qingtu Lake and the surrounding vegetation coverage before and after water transfer, by interpreting remote sensing data, the variation of water content in the vadose zone, and the groundwater level by obtaining field monitoring data, as well as the correlation between the water body area of Qingtu Lake and the highest vegetation coverage area in the following year. The conclusion is that there is a positive correlation between the water body area of Qingtu Lake in autumn and the vegetation coverage in each fractional vegetation coverage (FVC) interval in the next summer, especially in terms of the FVC of 3050%. The groundwater level and soil water content increase after water transfer and remain relatively high for the following months, which suggests that transferred water from upstream can be stored as groundwater or soil water in the subsurface through surface water and subsurface water interaction. These water sources can provide water for the vegetation growth the next spring, or support plants in the summer.

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“…Robust water resource management in semi-arid regions requires an understanding of the ways in which human activities or shifting climates can alter water balances and/or the duration of pool water persistence (Caldwell et al, 2020;Huang et al, 2020). In the absence of published literature quantifying the susceptibility of persistent pools, we present general guidance on the susceptibility of pools to https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2021-461 Preprint.…”

Section: Management Implications: Susceptibility Of Persistent Pools To Changing Hydrological Regimesmentioning

confidence: 99%

A hydrological framework for persistent river pools

Bourke

Shanafield

Hedley

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Abstract. Persistent surface water pools along non-perennial rivers represent an important water resource for plants, animals, and humans. While ecological studies of these features are not uncommon, these are rarely accompanied by a rigorous examination of the hydrological and hydrogeological characteristics that create or support the pools. Here we present an overarching framework for understanding the hydrology of persistent pools. We identified perched water, alluvial through flow and groundwater discharge as mechanisms that control the persistence of pools along river channels. Groundwater discharge is further categorized into that controlled by a geological contact or barrier (not previously described in the literature), and discharge controlled by topography. Emphasis is put on clearly defining through-flow pools and the different drivers of groundwater discharge, as this is lacking in the literature. A suite of diagnostic tools (including geological mapping, hydraulic data and hydrochemical surveys) is generally required to identify the mechanism(s) supporting persistent pools. Water fluxes to pools supported by through-flow alluvial and bedrock aquifers can vary seasonally and resolving these inputs is generally non-trivial. This framework allows the evaluation of the susceptibility of persistent pools along river channels to changes in climate or groundwater withdrawals. Finally, we present three case studies from the Hamersley Basin of north-western Australia to demonstrate how the available diagnostic tools can be applied within the proposed framework.

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A framework to assess the impact of ecological water conveyance on groundwater-dependent terrestrial ecosystems in arid inland river basins

Cited by 51 publications

References 57 publications

Assessing Vegetation Dynamics and Landscape Ecological Risk on the Mainstream of Tarim River, China

Assessing Vegetation Dynamics and Landscape Ecological Risk on the Mainstream of Tarim River, China

The Effect of Water Transfer during Non-growing Season on the Wetland Ecosystem via Surface and Groundwater Interactions in Arid Northwestern China

A hydrological framework for persistent river pools

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