Using radiometric fingerprinting and phosphorus to elucidate sediment transport dynamics in an agricultural watershed

Abstract The major goals of this study were to determine stream bed sediment erosion/deposition rates, sediment age, percent ‘new’ sediment, and suspended sediment origin during two storm events of contrasting magnitudes (11.9 mm over 5 h and 58.9 mm over 39 h) using fallout radionuclides (excess lead 210 – 210 Pb xs and beryllium 7 – 7 Be) and link the nature and type of sediment source contributions to potential phosphorus (P) off‐site transport. The study was conducted in cropland‐dominated and mixed land use subwatersheds in the non‐glaciated Pleasant Valley watershed (50 km 2 ) in South Central Wisconsin. Fine sediment deposition and erosion rates on stream beds varied from 0.76 to 119.29 mg cm −2 day −1 (at sites near the watershed outlet) and 1.72 to 7.72 mg cm −2 day −1 (at sites in the headwaters), respectively, during the two storm events. The suspended sediment age ranged from 123 ± 12 to 234 ± 33 days during the smaller storm event; however, older sediment was more prevalent ( p = 0.037) in the streams during the larger event with suspended sediment age ranging from 226 ± 9 to 322 ± 114 days. During the small and large storm event, percent new sediment in suspended sediment ranged from 5.3 ± 2.1 to 21.0 ± 2.9% and 5.3 ± 2.7 to 6.7 ± 5.7%, respectively. In the cropland‐dominated subwatershed, upland soils were the major source of suspended sediment, whereas in the mixed land use subwatershed, both uplands and stream banks had relatively similar contributions to suspended sediment. In‐stream (suspended and bed) sediment P levels ranged from 703 ± 193 to 963 ± 84 mg kg −1 during the two storm events. The P concentrations in suspended and bed sediment were reflective of the dominant sediment source (upland or stream bank or mixed). Overall, sediment transport dynamics showed significant variability between subwatersheds of different land use characteristics during two contrasting storm events. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.