Determination of sediment sources following a major wildfire and evaluation of the use of color properties and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) as tracers.

Purpose: This research aimed to determine if a severe wildfire caused changes in the source of sediment being delivered to downstream aquatic systems and evaluate the use of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and color properties as tracers.

Methods: Sediment samples were collected from 2018 to 2021 in three tributaries impacted by the 2018 Shovel Lake wildfire and from two sites on the mainstem of the Nechako River, British Columbia. Source samples were collected from burned and unburned soils as well as from channel banks and road-deposited sediment.

The seasonal movement of sediment-associated marine-derived nutrients in a morphologically diverse riverbed: the influence of salmon in an Interior British Columbia river.

Purpose: This study (1) investigated the extent to which flocculation and the hydrological and morphological attributes of an interior salmon-bearing river regulate the seasonal storage of marine-derived nutrients (MDN) and (2) compared the contribution of MDN to the fine bed sediment relative to other nutrient sources to the river.

Methods: Previous research has determined that the co-existence of re-suspended fine sediment, generated by salmon redd construction, with salmonid excretion and decay products in the water column creates ideal conditions for the flocculation of these inorganic and organic particles. Stored and suspended fine bed sediment was sampled from seven sites with varying morphologies and bed substrate down the length of a large spawning river in the interior of British Columbia over a 12-month period.

Annual pulses of copper-enriched sediment in a North American river downstream of a large lake following the catastrophic failure of a mine tailings storage facility.

Failures of mine tailings storage facilities (TSF) can have profound and long-lasting effects on the downstream receiving environment. Virtually all spills to date have been into river systems without large lakes that may buffer downstream impacts. In August 2014, the failure of the Mount Polley copper (Cu)-gold mine TSF in British Columbia, Canada, released ~25 × 10 m of water and solids; globally, this is the second largest TSF spill in history.

The bacterial community of Quesnel Lake sediments impacted by a catastrophic mine tailings spill differ in composition from those at undisturbed locations - two years post-spill.

The West Basin of Quesnel Lake (British Columbia, Canada) suffered a catastrophic disturbance event in August 2014 when mine tailings and scoured natural material were deposited into the lake's West Basin due to an impoundment failure at the adjacent Mount Polley copper-gold mine. The deposit covered a significant portion of the West Basin floor with a thick layer of material. Since lake sediments host bacterial communities that play key roles in the geochemical cycling in lacustrine environments, it is important to understand which groups inhabit the newly deposited material and what this implies for the ecological function of the West Basin.

Palaeogenomics of the Hydrocarbon Producing Microalga Botryococcus braunii.

Botryococcus braunii is a colonial microalga that appears early in the fossil record and is a sensitive proxy of environmental and hydroclimatic conditions. Palaeozoic Botryococcus fossils which contribute up to 90% of oil shales and approximately 1% of crude oil, co-localise with diagnostic geolipids from the degradation of source-signature hydrocarbons. However more recent Holocene sediments demonstrate no such association.

A deconvolutional Bayesian mixing model approach for river basin sediment source apportionment.

Increasing complexity in human-environment interactions at multiple watershed scales presents major challenges to sediment source apportionment data acquisition and analysis. Herein, we present a step-change in the application of Bayesian mixing models: Deconvolutional-MixSIAR (D-MIXSIAR) to underpin sustainable management of soil and sediment. This new mixing model approach allows users to directly account for the 'structural hierarchy' of a river basin in terms of sub-watershed distribution.

Sources of variability in fatty acid (FA) biomarkers in the application of compound-specific stable isotopes (CSSIs) to soil and sediment fingerprinting and tracing: A review.

Determining soil redistribution and sediment budgets in watersheds is often challenging. One of the methods for making such determinations employs soil and sediment fingerprinting techniques, using sediment properties such as geochemistry, fallout radionuclides, and mineral magnetism. These methods greatly improve the estimation of erosion and deposition within a watershed, but are limited when determining land use-based soil and sediment movement.

Selecting Color-based Tracers and Classifying Sediment Sources in the Assessment of Sediment Dynamics Using Sediment Source Fingerprinting.

The use of sediment color as a fingerprint property to determine sediment sources is an emerging technique that can provide a rapid and inexpensive means of investigating sediment sources. The present study aims to test the feasibility of color fingerprint properties to apportion sediment sources within the South Tobacco Creek Watershed (74 km) in Manitoba, Canada. Suspended sediment from 2009 to 2011 at six monitoring stations and potential source samples along the main stem of the creek were collected.

Evaluation of iron-phosphate as a source of internal lake phosphorus loadings.

Biological, physical and chemical characteristics of the water column of a shallow (Zmax = 9.2 m), small (surface area 3.8 km2) residential and recreational lake near Prince George, British Columbia, indicated that the system was being loaded internally with phosphorus (P) from the sediments.