Assessment of weathering processes: Comparisons between two mountain catchments in the Austro región in Ecuador

In this study, two catchments located in the Ecuadorian Andes are analyzed: The Tomebamba and the Jadan catchments. Both catchments have contrasting characteristics principally based on the intensity of human intervention; while the Tomebamba catchment is located in a relatively well-preserved area, the Jadan catchment has experienced strong changes over the last decades with impacts on land cover/use and the hydrologic processes. These contrasting characteristics are expected to affect the river chemistry in a different way and also to directly influence the fluxes of suspended and dissolved loads in relation with a theoretical equilibrium condition: ’steady-state’ which relates the exported mechanical and dissolved fluxes.