M-TROPICS/BVET - Cameroon

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Location

3° 25' 48" N, 11° 16' 48" E
Brief Site Description: 
The upper Nyong basin belongs to a morphological unit called “the Southern Cameroonian Plateau”.
Detailed Site Description: 

CZO BVET is INSU- and IRD-labeled. It is a monitoring tool that aims to increase our knowledge regarding the continental water and biogeochemical cycles and the dynamics of weathering processes in tropical environments. It is also dedicated to the study of anthropogenic impacts on the natural environment. These goals are achieved by the combined use of hydrological, geophysical, mineralogical, geochemical methods and modeling.

The monitoring of the Cameroon site is operated by personnels from the Yaoundé University and the CRH/IRGM, Yaoundé, Cameroon. The monitoring strategy is based on the acquisition of time series of climate, hydrology and geochemical data in tropical ecosystems from the Upper Nyong watershed. The integration of complementary spatial scales is privileged: (1) at the local scale, with Small Experimental Watershed (SEW) from 1 km2 devoted to process-based studies; (2) at the regional scale, from 1,000 to 10,000 km2, devoted to the quantification of fluxes of dissolved and particulate matters. A network of nested sub-basins within the Nyong River Basin (18,500 km2) in tropical humid forest mildly impacted by anthropogenic activities on the South Cameroon Plateau. The network is comprised of the Nsimi SEW (0.6 km2), and the sampling/gauging stations of Messam on the Awout River (206 km2), Pont So’o on the So’o River (3000 km2), and Mbalmayo (13,500 km2), Olama (18,500 km2) on the Nyong River.

https://mtropics.obs-mip.fr/

Also member of OZCAR Research Infrastructure

http://www.ozcar-ri.org/

 

Field Site Type: 
International CZO
Registration: 
Registered
Network(s): 
CRITEX
LTER
OZCAR
RBV
WEBB
Study Start Date: 
2000
Mean Annual Precipitation: 
1 680 millimeters / year
Average Annual Temperature: 
25°C
Average Summer Temperature: 
28°C
Average Winter Temperature: 
23°C
Land Cover: 
Evergreen Forest
Geology: 
igneous-mafic intrusive
Soil Order: 
Oxisol
Hydrology: Name: 
Humid
Hydrology: Surface water stream order: 
First Order
Second Order
Third Order
Hydrology: Surface water - Stream Flow Performance: 
Perennial
Intermittent
Hydrology: Groundwater: 
Arrangment of Aquifer Components - Complexly interbedded sequence of aquifers and confining beds
Climate: 
Tropical
Sub-Climate: 
Humid
Group visibility: 
Public - accessible to all site users