Ecolog colleagues, GSA welcomes the ecologically inclined! If your research involves streambanks please consider submitting an abstract to the following GSA session in Portland, Oregon. The deadline for abstracts is August 11.
The session is intended to bring together the broad community focused on streambanks, including studies of bank stability (and the role of vegetation), bank erosion/construction, stability structures and habitat, sediment budgets, channel-floodplain morphodynamics, and sediment fingerprinting. The session is sponsored by Hydrogeology and Quaternary Geology and Geomorphology divisions. Streambanks in Theory and Practice Session Abstract: Streambanks are fluvial features constructed by a river to define the active channel. They are inherently exchange landforms, serving at different times as both sediment source and sink. The morphology of streambanks is dictated by the stochastic and dynamic relationship between river hydrology (including both groundwater seepage and channel flow) and sediment transport. A myriad of other factors including channel and valley planform, hillslope processes, soil formation and chemistry, near-channel vegetation, and streambank grain size distribution impact bank morphology and stability. Understanding constructive and erosive processes acting on streambanks is a primary research focus for the watershed science community, bridging fluvial geomorphology, hydrogeology, aquatic ecology, and terrestrial ecology. Streambank stability is also an important consideration for stream restoration practitioners. Depending on the restoration objective, streambank stabilization is sometimes necessary. In the process of stabilizing the streambanks, practitioners often attempt to introduce structures that foster habitat complexity. From a water quality perspective, streambanks can constitute a net source of sediment, and therefore contribute to sediment pollution. However misconceptions about net contributions of sediment from streambanks both to the channel itself and to downstream reaches are pervasive. In addition, impacts of bank stabilization with respect to reducing net sediment loads, altering channel configuration and river hydrology, and ecological effects are poorly understood. The goals of this session are to demonstrate the state of the science for understanding constructive and erosive forces acting on streambanks and directly relate the science to the practice of bank stabilization, particularly focusing on circumstances in which bank stabilization is an effective or ineffective means of reducing net sediment loading. For any questions, please contact the session conveners: Patrick Belmont: [email protected] Katherine Skalak: [email protected] -- Patrick Belmont, Ph.D. Postdoctoral Associate, National Center for Earth-surface Dynamics, University of Minnesota, St. Anthony Falls Laboratory #2 Third Avenue SE Minneapolis, MN 55414 USA Fax: 612-624-4398
