Hydrology and Earth System Sciences www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci.net 1027-5606 1607-7938 13 10 2009 10.5194/hess-13-1867-2009 http://www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci.net/13/1867/2009/ http://www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci.net/13/1867/2009/hess-13-1867-2009.html http://www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci.net/13/1867/2009/hess-13-1867-2009.pdf 1867 1885 2009-10-14 Catchment-scale non-linear groundwater-surface water interactions in densely drained lowland catchments Y. van der Velde ype.vandervelde@wur.nl G. H. de Rooij P. J. J. F. Torfs Soil Physics, Ecohydrology and Groundwater management Group, Wageningen University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, The Netherlands Hydrology and quantitative water management Group, Wageningen University, P.O. Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, The Netherlands Freely discharging lowland catchments are characterized by a strongly seasonal contracting and expanding system of discharging streams and ditches. Due to this rapidly changing active channel network, discharge and solute transport cannot be modeled by a single characteristic travel path, travel time distribution, unit hydrograph, or linear reservoir. We propose a systematic spatial averaging approach to derive catchment-scale storage and discharge from point-scale water balances. The effects of spatial heterogeneity in soil properties, vegetation, and drainage network are lumped and described by a relation between groundwater storage and the spatial probability distribution of groundwater depths with measurable parameters. The model describes how, in lowland catchments, the catchment-scale flux from groundwater to surface water via various flow routes is affected by a changing active channel network, the unsaturated zone and surface ponding. 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