Solar-forced diurnal regulation of cave drip rates via phreatophyte evapotranspiration
13
Citation
55
Reference
10
Related Paper
Citation Trend
Abstract:
Abstract. We present results of a detailed study of drip rate variations at 12 drip discharge sites in Glory Hole Cave, New South Wales, Australia. Our novel time series analysis, using the wavelet synchrosqueezed transform, reveals pronounced oscillations at daily and sub-daily frequencies occurring in 8 out of the 12 monitored sites. These oscillations were not spatially or temporally homogenous, with different drip sites exhibiting such behaviour at different times of year in different parts of the cave. We test several hypotheses for the cause of the oscillations, including variations in pressure gradients between karst and cave due to cave breathing effects or atmospheric and earth tides, variations in hydraulic conductivity due to changes in viscosity of water with daily temperature oscillations, and solar-driven daily cycles of vegetative (phreatophytic) transpiration. We conclude that the only hypothesis consistent with the data and hydrologic theory is that daily oscillations are caused by solar-driven pumping by phreatophytic trees which are abundant at the site. The daily oscillations are not continuous and occur sporadically in short bursts (2–14 days) throughout the year due to non-linear modification of the solar signal via complex karst architecture. This is the first indirect observation leading to the hypothesis of tree water use in cave drip water. It has important implications for karst hydrology in regards to developing a new protocol to determine the relative importance of trends in drip rate, such as diurnal oscillations, and how these trends change over timescales of weeks to years. This information can also be used to infer karst architecture. This study demonstrates the importance of vegetation on recharge dynamics, information that will inform both process-based karst models and empirical estimation approaches. Our findings support a growing body of research exploring the impact of trees on speleothem paleoclimate proxies.The development of a statistical distribution of proper entrances among proper caves in a limestone karst is considered as a geomorphic process and described with stochastic geomorphic models. The models assume that entrances form and close independently at entrance sites and that the sites are randomly distributed among caves. Analysis of 820 caves in 10 regions on this basis finds that the best model is one assuming a proportional length dependence for mean site frequency on each cave. This model is used to obtain a constant which is characteristic of a karst and to predict the number and length distributions of entranceless caves and the length distribution of all caves in each region. The karst constant varies from about 0.0001 to 0.01 . Comparisons between the karst constants in the different regions suggest a correlation with the underlying karst processes and disclose an apparently unique karst situation in County Clare, Ireland. Predictions of complete length distributions of all caves show similarities not found in observed length distributions and support the conclusion that the proper interpretation of a cave region demands information about unobservable caves.
Unobservable
Constant (computer programming)
Cite
Citations (33)
The study deals with the geomorphology of karst caves in Ajloun governorate, aiming to show the role of mineral composition in the extent of contribution to the origin and development of karst caves. Besides studying the morphological characteristics of karst caves in order to achieve the objectives of the study, this article is based on the descriptive and analytical approach to study and analyze the data of the phenomenon in question. Morphometric measurements of nine caves were done through fieldwork. The study concludes that the caves were formed only in Calcite and Dolomite rocks and that the caves vary in the region in terms of their shapes, dimensions, and lengths. The length of these caves ranged between 3.40 - 30 meters, the height of the ceilings between 1.72 - 9.10 meters. Finally, the study shows a clear difference in the morphometric characteristics of these caves, especially the shapes and dimentions. Keywords: Natural characteristics, Morphometric characteristics, Karst caves, Ajloun area.
Cite
Citations (0)
Cite
Citations (2)
Muli Cave is the newly exploited tourist site following the Shanjuan Cave, Zhanggong Cave and Linggu Cave in County YiXing. By studying the characteristics of this cave such as the different development subareas, the causes of formation, the karst phenomena, the cave accretion and the environmental variation, it is known that this cave is a full filled reviving karst cave that revives after it had been fully filled by the accretion. This study not only enriches the content of the speleology, but also is of important practical significance in search of the underground water in karst cave areas.
Cite
Citations (2)
Cite
Citations (3)
Karst of Sangkulirang Mangkalihat is one of the greatest karst areas in Indonesia and has hundreds of caves. Some of those caves are located at Suaran Block, one of the main karst block at this karst. This paper aims to study the speleogenesis process, as the fundamental process on karst landscape and cave development in that area. Speleogenetic process can be examined from the shape of the cave passage using uniformitarianism approach. That principle creates speleomorphology as the study of cave passage form and the factors that affect it. The examination of the cave passages uses cave maps to see the form and direction of them. As the result, caves at Suaran Block are formed mainly driven by geological structures such as fault – fissures and bedding plane which is indicated by linear form of the cave passage and water flow which shows sinusoidal form of the cave passage. Some caves are shaped by the combination of geological structure and water flows make them have mixed-induced speleogenesis.
Bedding
Bed
Cite
Citations (3)