The conceptual foundation of this biocomplexity proposal is that river flood plains are regional centers of ecological organization. This system is dependent on interactions among dynamic, nonlinear physical and biological processes linking water, heat and materials (biota, sediment, and plant-growth nutrients), flux and retention to fluvial landscape change. Strong interactions between short-duration, high stream-power floods, channel and sediment movement, increased roughness due to presence of vegetation and dead wood and upwelling of groundwater creates a complex, dynamic distribution of resource patches, which we refer to as the shifting habitat mosaic. This rnosaic promotes biodiversity and complex food webs that sequester and transform energy and materials.
Using this conceptual foundation and the implications of two decades of research on expansive gravel-cobble flood plains in western USA rivers. we propose a set of working hypotheses that address emergent properties of these and other similar flood plains. We will improve and integrate our existing 3D hydrologic model with new channel change, heat flux and nutrient cycling model in a dynamic flood plain biogeochemical simulator that is initialized from remote sensing information. The goal is spatially explicit quantification of heat and nutrient fluxes in relation to the habitat dynamics.
We propose an educational component that proactively links the floodplain research with the summer academic program at the Flathead Lake Biological Station (FLBS), the natural resources curriculum of our local Native American college (Salish and Kootenai College) and an annual national workshop for environmental professionals and high school teachers.
