title: Does stream water chemistry reflect watershed characteristics?
abstract: In this study, we investigated the relationships between stream water chemistry and watershed characteristics (topography--mean altitude and slope; climate--mean annual temperature and precipitation; geology--geochemical reactivity; land cover; inhabitation--population density, road density and number of municipalities). We analyzed the concentrations of the major anions (Cl, F, NO3, SO4, SiO2), cations (Ca, Mg, Na, K, Mn, Fe, Al), trace elements (Li, Sr, Cu), ABS245, TDP (total dissolved phosphorus), pH, and conductivity at 3,220 diverse watersheds covering a wide variety of watershed characteristics in the Czech Republic. We used marginal and partial multivariate analyses to reveal the most important variables. The partial analysis showed that only 14% of the variance could be assigned to a specific factor and that 41% of the variance is shared among the factors, which indicated complex interactions between the watershed characteristics.
authors.affiliation: Department of Environmental Geochemistry and Biogeochemistry, Czech Geological Survey, Klárov 3, 118 21, Prague 1, Czech Republic. tomas.chuman@email.cz
authors.forename: Tomáš
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Chuman
authors.forename: Jakub
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hruška
authors.forename: Filip
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Oulehle
authors.forename: Pavla
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Gürtlerová
authors.forename: Vladimír
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Majer
mesh_terms: D004784:Environmental Monitoring / Q000379:methods*; D045483:Rivers / Q000737:chemistry*; D014874:Water Pollutants, Chemical / Q000032:analysis*; D014881:Water Supply / Q000032:analysis*
chemical_list: D014874:Water Pollutants, Chemical