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Abstract. Plant hydraulic properties are critical to predicting vegetation water use as part of land-atmosphere interactions and plant responses to drought. However, current measurements of plant hydraulic properties are labour-intensive, destructive, and difficult to scale up, consequently limiting the comprehensive characterization of whole-plant hydraulic properties and hydraulic parameterization in land-surface modelling. To address these challenges, we develop a method, a pumping-test analogue, using sap-flow and stem water-potential data to derive whole-plant hydraulic properties, namely maximum hydraulic conductance, effective capacitance, and Ψ50 (water potential at which 50 % loss of hydraulic conductivity occurs). Experimental trials on Allocasuarina verticillata indicate that the parameters derived over short periods (around 7 days) exhibit good representativity for predicting plant water use over at least one month. We applied this method to estimate near-continuous whole-plant hydraulic properties over one year, demonstrating its potential to supplement existing labour-intensive measurement approaches. The results reveal the seasonal plasticity of the effective plant hydraulic capacitance. They also confirm the seasonal plasticity of maximum hydraulic conductance and the hydraulic vulnerability curve, known in the plant physiology community while neglected in the hydrology and land-surface modelling community. It is found that the seasonal plasticity of hydraulic conductance is associated with climate variables, providing a way forward to represent seasonal plasticity in models. The relationship between derived maximum hydraulic conductance and Ψ50 also suggests a trade-off between hydraulic efficiency and safety of the plant. Overall, the pumping-test analogue offers potential for better representation of plant hydraulics in hydrological modelling, benefitting land-management and land-surface process forecasting. 

ABSTRACT The importance of subsurface water dynamics, such as water storage and flow partitioning, is well recognised. Yet, our understanding of their drivers and links to streamflow generation has remained elusive, especially in small headwater streams that are often data‐limited but crucial for downstream water quantity and quality. Large‐scale analyses have focused on streamflow characteristics across rivers with varying drainage areas, often overlooking the subsurface water dynamics that shape streamflow behaviour. Here we ask the question:What are the climate and landscape characteristics that regulate subsurface dynamic storage, flow path partitioning, and dynamics of streamflow generation in headwater streams?To answer this question, we used streamflow data and a widely‐used hydrological model (HBV) for 15 headwater catchments across the contiguous United States. Results show that climate characteristics such as aridity and precipitation phase (snow or rain) and land attributes such as topography and soil texture are key drivers of streamflow generation dynamics. In particular, steeper slopes generally promoted more streamflow, regardless of aridity. Streams in flat, rainy sites (< 30% precipitation as snow) with finer soils exhibited flashier regimes than those in snowy sites (> 30% precipitation as snow) or sites with coarse soils and deeper flow paths. In snowy sites, less weathered, thinner soils promoted shallower flow paths such that discharge was more sensitive to changes in storage, but snow dampened streamflow flashiness overall. Results here indicate that land characteristics such as steepness and soil texture modify subsurface water storage and shallow and deep flow partitioning, ultimately regulating streamflow response to climate forcing. As climate change increases uncertainty in water availability, understanding the interacting climate and landscape features that regulate streamflow will be essential to predict hydrological shifts in headwater catchments and improve water resources management. 

Abstract In this manuscript, I provide ideas that may help early‐career colleagues on their paths in science, especially in research and academia. I discuss the inevitability of failure at times, the importance of finding great collaborators and mentors and making time for the things that bring you joy in your life, and suggest a few practices that I hope make us more pleasant human beings. I share a few difficulties I've navigated and advice I've shared with my students, postdocs, and early‐career colleagues through the years. I hope such thoughts are useful, and help others find the joy in being a scientist. 

Dual-porosity models are often used to describe solute transport in heterogeneous media, but the parameters within these models (e.g., immobile porosity and mobile/immobile exchange rate coefficients) are difficult to identify experimentally or relate to measurable quantities. Here, we performed synthetic, pore-scale millifluidics simulations that coupled fluid flow, solute transport, and electrical resistivity (ER). A conductive-tracer test and the associated geoelectrical signatures were simulated for four flow rates in two distinct pore-scale model scenarios: one with intergranular porosity, and a second with an intragranular porosity also defined. With these models, we explore how the effective characteristic-length scale estimated from a best-fit dual domain mass transfer (DDMT) model compares to geometric aspects of the flow field. In both model scenarios we find that: (1) mobile domains and immobile domains develop even in a system that is explicitly defined with one domain; (2) the ratio of immobile to mobile porosity is larger at faster flow rates as is the mass-transfer rate; and (3) a comparison of length scales associated with the mass-transfer rate (Lα) and those associated with calculation of the Peclet number (LPe) show LPe is commonly larger than Lα. These results suggest that estimated immobile porosities from a DDMT model are not only a function of physically mobile or immobile pore space, but also are a function of the average linear pore-water velocity and physical obstructions to flow, which can drive the development of immobile porosity even in single-porosity domains. 

Streams impacted by historic mining activity are characterized by acidic pH, unique microbial communities, and abundant metal-oxide precipitation, all of which can influence groundwater-surface water exchange. We investigate how metal-oxide precipitates and hyporheic mixing mediate the composition of microbial communities in two streams receiving acid-rock and mine drainage near Silverton, Colorado, USA. A large, neutral pH hyporheic zone facilitated the precipitation of metal particles/colloids in hyporheic porewaters. A small, low pH hyporheic zone, limited by the presence of a low-permeability, iron-oxyhydroxide layer known as ferricrete, led to the formation of steep geochemical gradients and high dissolved-metal concentrations. To determine how these two hyporheic systems influence microbiome composition, we installed well clusters and deployed in situ microcosms in each stream to sample porewaters and sediments for 16S rRNA gene sequencing. Results indicated that distinct hydrogeochemical conditions were present above and below the ferricrete in the low pH system. A positive feedback loop may be present in the low pH stream where microbially-mediated precipitation of iron-oxides contribute to additional clogging of hyporheic pore spaces, separating abundant, iron-oxidizing bacteria (Gallionella spp.) above the ferricrete from rare, low-abundance bacteria below the ferricrete. Metal precipitates and colloids that formed in the neutral pH hyporheic zone were associated with a more diverse phylogenetic community of nonmotile, nutrient-cycling bacteria that may be transported through hyporheic pore spaces. In summary, biogeochemical conditions influence, and are influenced by, hyporheic mixing, which mediates the distribution of micro-organisms and thus the cycling of metals in streams receiving acid-rock and mine drainage. 

Abstract Geophysical methods have long been used in earth and environmental science for the characterization of subsurface properties. While imaging the subsurface opens the “black box” of subsurface heterogeneity, we argue here that these tools can be used in a more powerful way than characterization, which is to develop and test hypotheses. Critical zone science has opened new questions and hypotheses in the hydrologic sciences holistically around controls on water fluxes between surface, biological, and underground compartments. While groundwater flows can be monitored in boreholes, water fluxes from the atmosphere to the aquifer through the soil and the root system are more complex to study than boreholes can inform upon. Here, we focus on the successful application of various geophysical tools to explore hypotheses in critical zone hydrogeology and highlight areas where future contributions could be made. Specifically, we look at questions around subsurface structural controls on flow, the dimensionality and partitioning of those flows in the subsurface, plant water uptake, and how geophysics may be used to constrain reactive transport. We also outline areas of future research that may push the boundaries of how geophysical methods are used to quantify critical zone complexity. This article is categorized under:Water and Life > Nature of Freshwater EcosystemsScience of Water > Hydrological ProcessesWater and Life > Methods