Data on fluvial suspended-sediment response to wildfire and a major post-fire flood

This data publication includes tabular streamflow and fluvial suspended-sediment data collected from roughly May through early October of 2013, 2014, and 2015 at the mouths of three severely burned small tributary gulches along the South Fork Cache la Poudre River in Colorado. The purpose of this study was to investigate the suspended-sediment response to the High Park fire (June 2012). During the post-fire monitoring period, a ~100-year flood occurred in the study area as part of broader-scale flooding along the Colorado Front Range (September 2013). These data therefore show the suspended-sediment response to a sequential disturbance composed of a severe wildfire closely followed by a major flood. There are four measurement locations. Measurements were made downstream of the confluence of each severely burned tributary gulch (the Bridge site, which is downstream of the Ratville Gulch confluence, the Woodpecker Woods confluence, and the Rocky Top confluence), in addition to a fourth site upstream of the Woodpecker Woods confluence. Data include stream discharge, electrical conductivity, water temperature, turbidity, and precipitation recorded every 10 minutes at most sites. Suspended sediment concentration (SSC) data are also provided; some SSC samples were analyzed for organic/inorganic and coarse/fine components, while some were analyzed only for total SSC. SSC data were collected every 12 hours during snowmelt runoff. During the summer storm season, SSC data were collected when turbidity exceeded 10 Nephelometric turbidity units.
These purpose of this study was to quantify suspended-sediment concentrations and yield throughout the fire-flood sequence and subsequent watershed recovery.
For more information about these data and this study, see Ryan-Burkett et al. (2024).