Stream Biogeochemistry Lab

Dept. of Limnology and Bio-Oceanography | University of Vienna

FIELD SITES

Soil Runoff Samplers (SRS) - identification of soil contributions to small streams

Within the HYDRO-DIVERSITY Project, an explicit evaluation of the inputs of soilwater to small streams during storm events was necessary. Thus we built three SRS stations that are located in close proximity to six small first-order streams draining into lake Lunz. The stations record the volume of precipitation and soil water. The soil water is collected from two stainless steel collectors with a width of approximately 2m, placed at two different soil depth. Each collector routes the water into modified rain gages to be able to quantify the water flows per time. Below the gages, funnels can be installed to easily collect soil water samples for chemical and microbial analysis.

Sensor data at present includes water volume (from tipping buckets) and soil and air temperature. Data collection is performed with self-developed logger systems that are based on battery-powered Arduino microprocessors. The loggers saves all data directly to a SD-card. This cost-effective, flexible and robust system has originated from the work of our electronics-experts Mike Mayr and Jakob Schelker.

Location of SRS sites around lake Lunz (red squares) and the six first-order streams that are regularly monitored (WCL1 and WCL2, SBG1 and SBG2, RBG2 and RBG3, sampling sites as black dots). The RBG1 stream was initially also sampled, but showed to be unfavorable for the study. Map by Florian Caillon.