Abstract
Purpose
Sediment fingerprinting with elemental tracers is widely used to identify sources of sediment to rivers. However, due to the need to isolate large amounts of suspended sediment, this approach can be difficult to implement in remote locations, such as the Mara River in Kenya, where high (and increasing) sediment loads are of concern.
Materials and methods
We report several innovations that allowed us to carry out sediment fingerprinting in a portion (>6,500 km2) of the Mara River Basin. First, we utilized sediment-laden filters (sediment mass ∼0.1 g) for our river samples, rather than the traditional approach of extracting >1 g of sediment from large volumes of water. This allowed us to easily collect flow-weighted samples, and to process and analyze samples without access to centrifugation equipment. We carried out extensive quality control tests to ensure that we could reproducibly measure elemental concentrations of sediment trapped on filters. Second, we modified a readily available Bayesian inference mixing model (Stable Isotope Analysis in R) to create source signatures and to apportion downstream samples to sources. Third, we included hippo feces as a potential source, given the critical role that large wildlife plays in this ecosystem.
Results and discussion
We found that: (1) sediment captured by filtration can be digested and analyzed reproducibly and used in sediment fingerprinting; (2) our four sources (three geographic categories and hippo feces) were reasonably well-separated in their signatures; (3) the three sub-basins all contributed substantially to sediment loading in the Mara; and (4) hippo feces contributed a small, but measurable, proportion of sediment in this system.
Conclusions
Sediment-laden filters can be used successfully in identifying sediment sources through fingerprinting. The modified method of sediment fingerprinting should prove useful in other remote river basins. Our results support the hypothesis that the Upper Mara is important in supplying sediments to the river, while also highlighting the Talek sub-basin as a major contributor.
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Acknowledgments
This study was supported by the Tropical Resources Institute, the Carpenter-Sperry Fund, and the Lindsay Fellowship. The Kenya National Council for Science and Technology authorized this research. Musombi Kibberenge and the National Museums of Kenya provided logistical support. Brian Heath and the Mara Conservancy, Rekero Camp, Olerai Mara Farms, and Patrick Beresford of Governor’s Camp provided assistance in the field. Amanda Subalusky, J.J. Weis, and David Post from the Yale Ecology and Evolutionary Biology department assisted with field sampling. Three anonymous reviewers provided suggestions that greatly improved this manuscript.
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Dutton, C., Anisfeld, S.C. & Ernstberger, H. A novel sediment fingerprinting method using filtration: application to the Mara River, East Africa. J Soils Sediments 13, 1708–1723 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-013-0725-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-013-0725-z