PARENT SESSION
Oral Session #30: Modeling.
Presiding: T. Day
Tuesday, August 6. 8:00 AM to 11:30 AM. Apache Meeting Room, TCC.

Simulating channel recovery in riparian ecosystems: an interoperable, multi-scale approach.

DAVID, JOHN^*,1, DIXON, MARK¹, WU, JIANGUO¹, STROMBERG, JULIET¹, ¹ ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY, TEMPE, AZ

ABSTRACT- The interplay between fluvial geomorphology and vegetation is an important consideration in restoration and management of riparian ecosystems. Because most ecological problems are multi-scale, and management actions are often mismatched to the ecologically relevant process rates of interest, there exists a need to evaluate the long-term consequences and implications of management decisions. For example, in managed flood releases for cottonwood-willow regeneration, seedling germination and survival are sensitive to river stage decline at the rate of cm/day, whereas reservoir management and planning operates within seasons to years and thousands of acre-feet. Simulation methods provide an effective means for examining the long-term and regional consequences of different restoration or management scenarios. Using Hierarchical Patch Dynamics (HPD) as an operational framework to manage the overall problem complexity, we present a series of interlinked vegetation and geomorphic models to examine the interaction of sediment transport with the stabilizing influence of vegetation establishment, and their combined influence on channel recovery after catastrophic disturbance. We also explore the potential effects of groundwater decline and changes in precipitation and flood dynamics, associated with global climate change, as contexts on channel-vegetation recovery. These examples illustrate the utility of HPD as a framework for decomposing large complex and multi-scale restoration and management problems.

KEY WORDS: geomorphology, riparian, modeling, interoperability