river itchen - water cycle

precipitation

february to september (c.60mm),October to january is higher but also steady (c.100mm)

topography

gentle undulations,low lying

vegetation cover

some sporadic woodland mostly grassland (shorten lagtime)

rural land use

predominant residential,negligible industry

soils

loamy,some sandy (porous) - long lagtime,shallow rising

rocks

chalk,porous-limb

groundwater store

significant aquifer

river

itchen,45km,two tributaries (candover stream,cheriton stream)

flooding events

last major flood winter 2014

regime of the river itchen at easton 2015

the flow is high from november to february (c.5 cumecs) following high and steady rainfall from October to January (c.100mm)

the river regime is steady not flashy because

the arable land use encourages interception and infiltration on which slows movement of precipitation to the channel

loamy soil encourages infiltration to the soil store and gentle induraction encourage slow through flow to the channel

why does the river itchen differ from the regime of the river kent

the kiver kent is flashy compared to itchen

this is due to the impermeable igneous rock which makes it harder to infiltrate whilst itchen has loamy soil so more infiltration can happen

a lot of surface run off altitude is steep

the land use is heather moorland and peat with most land glazed -less vegetation so less interception

give reasons for similarities and differences of the river downstream

geology,topography and land use remains broadly the same so the regime very similar

but the drainage system is narrower at highbridge