Flood events, a multiple basin response to precipitation events at different scales

Results in the small catchment of the Kartel-bornsbach have shown that summ er events lead to typical types of flood waves that can be classified accor ding to their response patterns. Differences to this pattern are due to the precipitation amount and duration and in some times to the pre-event moist ure of the soil. The results show further that the Kartelbornsbach catchmen t can be considered as a block system where spatial differences are respons ible for the basic pattern of the reaction but not for differences between flood events. Small catchments are excellent tools for relatively inexpensi ve hydrological and hydrochemical research on streamflow generation mechani sms. With increasing size of the basin the response becomes less clear, bec ause the spatial distribution of rainfall and the distance of delivering ar eas from the sampling station mask or modify the type of response. Although the main flow components may not change, there is a considerable shift in the composition of water quality, because the increase of travel time does not affect all flow components at the same rate.