Abstract
An evaluation of drainage network of Mahe river basin (394 km2), Kerala, India, with a humid tropical setting is carried out using geospatial techniques. The streams of the basin generally conform to Horton’s laws. However, the correlation between mean stream length and stream order is low (r = +0.55), probably due to an abrupt increase in mean stream length in the highest orders of the subwatersheds. The Subwatersheds in the extreme eastern part of the basin are characterized by maximum relief, and gradients exhibit highest runoff and susceptibility to flooding and inundation. The lineament zones and associated tectonic activity control the drainage patterns and disposition of subwatersheds. The various linear and spatial morphometric parameters of each subwatershed are ranked based on their susceptibility to flooding. Subwatersheds III–VI are environmental hot spots, where implementation of flood control and mitigation measures should be urgently focused. The other subwatersheds steady are found to be in steady state equilibrium with components like climate, lithology, tectonics and topography that determine origin and development of a drainage basin. Major flooding rarely occurs in Mahe, in spite of favourable morphometric characters in other parts of the basin, and is attributed to permeable lateritic nature and dominant areal extent of SW IX in the western most extreme.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Agarwal CS (1998) Study of drainage pattern through aerial data in Naugarh area of Varanasi district, UP. J Indian Soc of Remote Sensi 26(4):169–175
Chithra C, Alaguraja P, Ganesh K, Yuvaraj D, Manvel M (2011) Watershed characteristics of Kundah sub basin using remote sensing and GIS techniques. Int J Geomat Geosci 2:311–335
Chorley RJ (1969) Introduction to physical hydrology. Methuen and Co., Ltd., Suffolk, p 211
Chorley RJ, Malm DE, Pogorzelski HA (1957) A new standard for estimating drainage basin shape. Amer J Sci 225:138–141
Gopinath G, Ashitha MK (2014) Elicitation of erosional signature of a tropical river basin with high-resolution stereo data. Appl Geomat 6:149–157. doi:10.1007/s12518-014-0127-
Gopinath G, Nair AG, Ambily GK, Swetha TV (2015) Watershed prioritization based on morphometric analysis coupled with multi criteria decision making. Arab J Geosci 2(2):01–17. doi:10.1007/s12517-015-2238-0
Horton RE (1945) Erosional development of streams and their drainage basins: Hydrophysical approach to quantitative morphology. Geolog Soc Am Bull 56:275–370
Kalyanjit S, Jha LK, Tiwari BK (2012) Morphometric analysis of a highland micro watershed in East Kasi hills district of Meghalaya India: using remote sensing and GIS techniques. J Geogr Reg Plan 5:142–150
Keller EA, Pinter N (1996) Active tectonics earthquake uplift and landscapes. Prentice Hall, New Jersey
Luo W (2000) Quantifying groundwater sapping processes with a hypsometric analysis technique. J Geophys Res 105:1685–1694
Schumm SA (1956) The relation of drainage basin relief to sediment loss. Int Assoc Sci Hydrol 36:216–219
Sivakumar V, Biju C, Deshmukh B (2011) Hypsometric analysis of Varattaru river basin of Harur Taluk, Dharmapuri district, Tamil Nadu, India, using geomatics technology. Int J Geomat Geosci 2:241–246
Singh S, Singh MC (1997) Morphometric analysis of Kanhar river basin. Nat Geogr J India 43(1):31–43
Soman K (2002) Geology of Kerala. Geological Society of India, Bangalore, p 335
Strahler AN (1957) Dynamic basics of geomorphology. Bull Geol Soc Am 63:923–928
Strahler AN (1952) Hypsometric analysis of erosional topology. Geolog Soc Am Bull 63(11):1117–1142
Strahler AN (1964) Quantitative geomorphology of drainage basins and channel networks. In: Chow VT (ed) Handbook of applied hydrology (Network; Mc Graw hill) section, pp 4–11
Acknowledgements
The authors are very thankful to the Executive Director, CWRDM (Centre for Water Resources Development and Management), Kozhikode, Kerala, India, for providing the facilities and guidance for preparation of the manuscript.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
About this paper
Cite this paper
Gopinath, G., Ramisha, N., Nair, A.G., Jesiya, N.P. (2018). Spatial Characters of a Tropical River Basin, South-West Coast of India. In: Singh, V., Yadav, S., Yadava, R. (eds) Hydrologic Modeling. Water Science and Technology Library, vol 81. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-5801-1_44
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-5801-1_44
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Singapore
Print ISBN: 978-981-10-5800-4
Online ISBN: 978-981-10-5801-1
eBook Packages: Earth and Environmental ScienceEarth and Environmental Science (R0)