Simulating streamflow in the Upper Halda Basin of southeastern Bangladesh using SWAT model

ABSTRACT

Most catchments in tropical regions are ungauged and data deficient, complicating the simulation of water quantity and quality. Yet, developing and testing hydrological models in data-poor regions is vital to support water management. Here, we used the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) to predict stream runoff in Halda Basin in Bangladesh. While the calibrated model’s performance was satisfactory (R² = 0.80, NSE = 0.71), the model was unable to track the extreme low flow peaks due to the temporal and spatial variability of rainfall which may not be fully captured by using data from one rainfall gauging station. Groundwater delay time, baseflow alpha factor and curve number were the most sensitive parameters influencing model performance. This study improves understanding of the key processes of a catchment in a data-poor, monsoon driven, small river basin and could serve as a baseline for scenario modelling for future water management and policy framework.     

The value of remotely sensed surface soil moisture for model calibration using SWAT

Remotely sensed (RS) data can add value to a hydrological model calibration. Among this, RS soil moisture (SM) data have mostly been assimilated into conceptual hydrological models using various transformed variable or indices. In this study, raw RS surface SM is used as a calibration variable in the Soil and Water Assessment Tool model. This means the SM values were not transformed into another variable (e.g., soil water index and root zone SM index). Using a nested catchment, calibration based only on RS SM and optimizing model parameters sensitive to SM using particle swarm optimization improved variations in streamflow predictions at some of the gauging stations compared to the uncalibrated model. This highlighted part of the catchments where the SM signal directly influenced the flow distribution. Additionally, highlighted high and low flow signals were mostly influenced. The seasonal breakdown indicates that the SM signal is more useful for calibrating in wetter seasons and in areas with higher variations in elevation. The results identified that calibration only on RS SM improved the general rainfall–runoff response simulation by introducing delays but cannot correct the overall routing effect. Furthermore, catchment characteristics (e.g., land use, elevation, soil types, and precipitation) regulating SM variation in different seasons highlighted by the model calibration are identified. This provides further opportunities to improve model parameterization.     

Comparison of abstraction scenarios simulated by SWAT and SWAT-MODFLOW

In hydrological modelling of catchments, wherein streams are groundwater-fed, an accurate representation of groundwater processes and their interaction with surface water is crucial. With this purpose, a coupled model was recently developed linking SWAT (Soil and Water Assessment Tool) with the fully-distributed groundwater model MODFLOW (Modular Groundwater Flow). In this study, SWAT and SWAT-MODFLOW were applied to a Danish groundwater-dominant catchment, simulating groundwater abstraction scenarios and assessing the benefits and drawbacks of SWAT-MODFLOW. Both models demonstrated good performance. However, SWAT-MODFLOW provided more realistic outputs when simulating abstraction: the decrease in streamflow was similar to the volume of water abstracted, while in SWAT the impact was negligible. SWAT also showed impacts on streamflow only when abstractions were taken from the shallow aquifer, not from the deep aquifer. Overall, SWAT-MODFLOW demonstrated wider possibilities for groundwater analysis, providing more insights than SWAT in supporting decision making in relation to environmental assessment.     

Effect of single and multi-site calibration techniques on hydrological model performance,parameter estimation and predictive uncertainty: a case study in the Logone catchment,Lake Chad basin

Understanding hydrological processes at catchment scale through the use of hydrological model parameters is essential for enhancing water resource management. Given the difficulty of using lump parameters to calibrate distributed catchment hydrological models in spatially heterogeneous catchments, a multiple calibration technique was adopted to enhance model calibration in this study. Different calibration techniques were used to calibrate the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model at different locations along the Logone river channel. These were: single-site calibration (SSC); sequential calibration (SC); and simultaneous multi-site calibration (SMSC). Results indicate that it is possible to reveal differences in hydrological behavior between the upstream and downstream parts of the catchment using different parameter values. Using all calibration techniques, model performance indicators were mostly above the minimum threshold of 0.60 and 0.65 for Nash Sutcliff Efficiency (NSE) and coefficient of determination (R ²) respectively, at both daily and monthly time-steps. Model uncertainty analysis showed that more than 60% of observed streamflow values were bracketed within the 95% prediction uncertainty (95PPU) band after calibration and validation. Furthermore, results indicated that the SC technique out-performed the other two methods (SSC and SMSC). It was also observed that although the SMSC technique uses streamflow data from all gauging stations during calibration and validation, thereby taking into account the catchment spatial variability, the choice of each calibration method will depend on the application and spatial scale of implementation of the modelling results in the catchment.     

Multi‐variable and multi‐site calibration and validation of SWAT in a large mountainous catchment with high spatial variability

Many methods developed for calibration and validation of physically based distributed hydrological models are time consuming and computationally intensive. Only a small set of input parameters can be optimized, and the optimization often results in unrealistic values. In this study we adopted a multi‐variable and multi‐site approach to calibration and validation of the Soil Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model for the Motueka catchment, making use of extensive field measurements. Not only were a number of hydrological processes (model components) in a catchment evaluated, but also a number of subcatchments were used in the calibration. The internal variables used were PET, annual water yield, daily streamflow, baseflow, and soil moisture. The study was conducted using an 11‐year historical flow record (1990–2000); 1990–94 was used for calibration and 1995–2000 for validation. SWAT generally predicted well the PET, water yield and daily streamflow. The predicted daily streamflow matched the observed values, with a Nash–Sutcliffe coefficient of 0·78 during calibration and 0·72 during validation. However, values for subcatchments ranged from 0·31 to 0·67 during calibration, and 0·36 to 0·52 during validation. The predicted soil moisture remained wet compared with the measurement. About 50% of the extra soil water storage predicted by the model can be ascribed to overprediction of precipitation; the remaining 50% discrepancy was likely to be a result of poor representation of soil properties. Hydrological compensations in the modelling results are derived from water balances in the various pathways and storage (evaporation, streamflow, surface runoff, soil moisture and groundwater) and the contributions to streamflow from different geographic areas (hill slopes, variable source areas, sub‐basins, and subcatchments). The use of an integrated multi‐variable and multi‐site method improved the model calibration and validation and highlighted the areas and hydrological processes requiring greater calibration effort. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hybrid modelling approach to prairie hydrology: fusing data-driven and process-based hydrological models

Abstract

Much of the prairie region in North America is characterized by relatively flat terrain with many depressions on the landscape. The hydrological response (runoff) is a combination of the conventional runoff from the contributing areas and the occasional overflow from the non-contributing areas (depressions). In this study, we promote the use of a hybrid modelling structure to predict runoff generation from prairie landscapes. More specifically, the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) is fused with artificial neural networks (ANNs), so that SWAT and the ANN module deal with the contributing and non-contributing areas, respectively. A detailed experimental study is performed to select the best set of inputs, training algorithms and hidden neurons. The results obtained in this study suggest that the fusion of process-based and data-driven models can provide improved modelling capabilities for representing the highly nonlinear nature of the hydrological processes in prairie landscapes.

Editor D. Koutsoyiannis; Associate editor L. See     

Modelling hydrological response to different land‐use and climate change scenarios in the Zamu River basin of northwest China

Changes in climate and land use can significantly influence the hydrological cycle and hence affect water resources. Understanding the impacts of climate and land‐use changes on streamflow can facilitate development of sustainable water resources strategies. This study investigates the flow variation of the Zamu River, an inland river in the arid area of northwest China, using the Soil and Water Assessment Tool distributed hydrological model. Three different land‐use and climate‐change scenarios were considered on the basis of measured climate data and land‐use cover, and then these data were input into the hydrological model. Based on the sensitivity analysis, model calibration and verification, the hydrological response to different land‐use and climate‐change scenarios was simulated. The results indicate that the runoff varied with different land‐use type, and the runoff of the mountain reaches of the catchment increased when grassland area increased and forestland decreased. The simulated runoff increased with increased precipitation, but the mean temperature increase decreased the runoff under the same precipitation condition. Application of grey correlation analysis showed that precipitation and temperature play a critical role in the runoff of the Zamu River basin. Sensitivity analysis of runoff to precipitation and temperature by considering the 1990s land use and climate conditions was also undertaken. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Model calibration using hydropedological insights to improve the simulation of internal hydrological processes using SWAT+

Soils affect the distribution of hydrological processes by partitioning precipitation into different components of the water balance. Therefore, understanding soil-water dynamics at a catchment scale remains imperative to future water resource management. In this study, the value of hydropedological insights was examined to calibrate a processes-based model. Soil morphology was used as soft data to assist in the calibration of the Soil Water Assessment Tool (SWAT+) model at five different catchment scales (48, 56, 174, 674, and 2421 km²) in the Sabie River catchment, South Africa. The aim of this study was to calibrate the SWAT+ model to accurately simulate long-term monthly streamflow predictions as well as to reflect internal soil hydrological processes using a procedure focusing on hydropedology as a calibration tool in a multigauge system. Results indicated that calibration improved streamflow predictions where R² improved by 2%–8%. Nash-Sutcliffe Efficiency (NSE) improved from negative correlations to values exceeding 0.5 at four of the five catchment scales compared to the uncalibrated model. Results confirm that soil mapping units can be calibrated individually within SWAT+ to improve the representation of hydrological processes. Particularly, the spatial linkage between hydropedology and hydrological processes, which is captured within the soil map of the catchment, can be adequately reflected within the model simulations after calibration. This research will lead to an improved understanding of hydropedology as soft data to improve hydrological modelling accuracy.     

A watershed rainfall data recovery approach with application to distributed hydrological models

Watershed areal rainfall estimation, which is one of the most important and fundamental aspects in hydrological forecasting and various kinds of catchment‐scale hydrological models, is widely used in the analysis of hydrological regime change, and its precision has a direct influence on the accuracy of hydrological forecasting and hydrological simulation. In China, it is difficult to obtain the watershed areal rainfall estimate with reliable precision and avoid the phenomenon of ‘the same effect of different parameters’ because of the low density of the rain gauge network. Therefore, a watershed rainfall data recovery approach of improving the precision of watershed areal rainfall estimation is proposed here. This approach is to build new observatories, establish the time–space relations of rainfall between newly built observatories and previously built observatories in a relatively short interval and then recover the rainfall data of newly built observatories prior to their construction through simulating the relations over a longer time. As a result, watershed rainfall information could be elaborated to improve the precision of watershed areal rainfall estimate and avoid the phenomenon of ‘the same effect of different parameters’ to a certain degree in the process of hydrological simulation. The approach is used in the hydrological simulation of Hali River catchment. In combination with the Soil Water Assessment Tool model, a better result can be obtained in the hydrological simulation. Therefore, the approach can be used in other similar catchments. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Snow cover and runoff modelling in a high mountain catchment with scarce data: effects of temperature and precipitation parameters

Snowmelt is an important source of runoff in high mountain catchments. Snowmelt modelling for alpine regions remains challenging with scarce gauges. This study simulates the snowmelt in the Karuxung River catchment in the south Tibetan Plateau using an altitude zone based temperature‐index model, calibrates the snow cover area and runoff simulation during 2003–2005 and validates the model performance via snow cover area and runoff simulation in 2006. In the snowmelt and runoff modelling, temperature and precipitation are the two most important inputs. Relevant parameters, such as critical snow fall temperature, temperature lapse rate and precipitation gradient, determine the form and amount of precipitation and distribution of temperature and precipitation in hydrological modelling of the sparsely gauged catchment. Sensitivity analyses show that accurate estimation of these parameters would greatly help in improving the snowmelt simulation accuracy, better describing the snow‐hydrological behaviours and dealing with the data scarcity at higher elevations. Specifically, correlation between the critical snow fall temperature and relative humidity and seasonal patterns of both the temperature lapse rate and the precipitation gradient should be considered in the modelling studies when precipitation form is not logged and meteorological observations are only available at low elevation. More accurate simulation of runoff involving snowmelt, glacier melt and rainfall runoff will improve our understanding of hydrological processes and help assess runoff impacts from a changing climate in high mountain catchments. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Modelling the impacts of spatial heterogeneity in soil hydraulic properties on hydrological process in the upper reach of the Heihe River in the Qilian Mountains,Northwest China

Spatial heterogeneity of soil has great impacts on dynamic processes of the hydrological systems. However, it is challenging and expensive to obtain spatial distribution of soil hydraulic properties, which often requires extensive soil sampling and observations and intensive laboratory analyses, especially in high elevation, hard to access mountainous areas. This study evaluates the impacts of soil heterogeneity on hydrological process in a high elevation, topographically complex watershed in Northwest China. Two approaches were used to derive the spatial heterogeneity of soil properties in the study watershed: (1) the spatial clustering method, Full‐Order‐CLK was used to determine five soil heterogeneous clusters (configurations 97, 80, 60, 40 and 20) through large number of soil sampling and in situ observations, and (2) the average values of soil hydraulic properties for each soil type were derived from the coarse provincial soil data sets (Gansu Soil Handbook at 1 : 1 000 000 scale). Subsequently, Soil and Water Assessment Tool model was used to quantify the impact of the spatial heterogeneity of soil hydraulic properties on hydrological process in the study watershed. Results show the simulations by Soil and Water Assessment Tool with the spatially clustered soil hydraulic information from the field sampling data had much better representation of the soil heterogeneity and had more accurate performance than the model using the average soil property values for each soil type derived from the coarse soil data sets. Thus, incorporating detailed field sampling, soil heterogeneity data greatly improve performance in hydrological modelling. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Attribution of changes in the water balance of a tropical catchment to land use change using the SWAT model

Changes in the water balance of the Samin catchment (277.9 km²) on Java, Indonesia, can be attributed to land use change using the Soil Water Assessment Tool model. A baseline‐altered method was used in which the simulation period 1990–2013 was divided into 4 equal periods to represent baseline conditions (1990–1995) and altered land use conditions (1996–2001, 2002–2007, and 2008–2013). Land use maps for 1994, 2000, 2006, and 2013 were acquired from satellite images. A Soil Water Assessment Tool model was calibrated for the baseline period and applied to the altered periods with and without land use change. Incorporating land use change resulted in a Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency of 0.7 compared to 0.6 when land use change is ignored. In addition, the model performance for simulations without land use change gradually decreased with time. Land use change appeared to be the important driver for changes in the water balance. The main land use changes during 1994–2013 are a decrease in forest area from 48.7% to 16.9%, an increase in agriculture area from 39.2% to 45.4%, and an increase in settlement area from 9.8% to 34.3%. For the catchment, this resulted in an increase of the runoff coefficient from 35.7% to 44.6% and a decrease in the ratio of evapotranspiration to rainfall from 60% to 54.8%. More pronounced changes can be observed for the ratio of surface runoff to stream flow (increase from 26.6% to 37.5%) and the ratio of base flow to stream flow (decrease from 40% to 31.1%), whereas changes in the ratio of lateral flow to stream flow were minor (decrease from 33.4% to 31.4%). At sub‐catchment level, the effect of land use changes on the water balance varied in different sub‐catchments depending on the scale of changes in forest and settlement area.     

Climate models and hydrological parameter uncertainties in climate change impacts on monthly runoff and daily flow duration curve of a Mediterranean catchment

ABSTRACT

Climate models and hydrological parameter uncertainties were quantified and compared while assessing climate change impacts on monthly runoff and daily flow duration curve (FDC) in a Mediterranean catchment. Simulations of the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model using an ensemble of behavioural parameter sets derived from the Generalized Likelihood Uncertainty Estimation (GLUE) method were approximated by feed-forward artificial neural networks (FF-NN). Then, outputs of climate models were used as inputs to the FF-NN models. Subsequently, projected changes in runoff and FDC were calculated and their associated uncertainty was partitioned into climate model and hydrological parameter uncertainties. Runoff and daily discharge of the Chiba catchment were expected to decrease in response to drier and warmer climatic conditions in the 2050s. For both hydrological indicators, uncertainty magnitude increased when moving from dry to wet periods. The decomposition of uncertainty demonstrated that climate model uncertainty dominated hydrological parameter uncertainty in wet periods, whereas in dry periods hydrological parametric uncertainty became more important.

Editor M.C. Acreman; Associate editor S. Kanae     

Change in low flows due to catchment management dynamics—Application of a comparative modelling approach

Understanding the natural low flow of a catchment is critical for effective water management policy in semi-arid and arid lands. The Geba catchment in Ethiopia, forming the headwaters of Tekeze-Atbara basin was known for its severe land degradation before the recent large scale Soil and Water conservation (SWC) programs. Such interventions can modify the hydrological processes by changing the partitioning of the incoming rainfall on the land surface. However, the literature lacks studies to quantify the hydrological impacts of these interventions in the semi-arid catchments of the Nile basin. Statistical test and Indicators of Hydrological Alteration (IHA) were used to identify the trends of streamflow in two comparatives adjacent (one treated with intensive SWC intervention and control with fewer interventions) catchments. A distributed hydrological model was developed to understand the differences in hydrological processes of the two catchments. The statistical and IHA tools showed that the low flow in the treated catchment has significantly increased while considerably decreased in the control catchment. Comparative analysis confirmed that the low flow in the catchment with intensive SWC works was greater than that of the control by >30% while the direct runoff was lower by >120%. This implies a large proportion of the rainfall in the treated catchment is infiltrated and recharge aquifers which subsequently contribute to streamflow during the dry season. The proportion of soil storage was more than double compared to the control catchment. Moreover, hydrological response comparison from pre- and post-intervention showed that a drastic reduction in direct runoff (>84%) has improved the low flow by >55%. This strongly suggests that the ongoing intensive SWC works have significantly improved the low flows while it contributed to the reduction of total streamflow in the catchment.     

Accuracy of grid precipitation data for Brazil: application in river discharge modelling of the Tocantins catchment

Here, we compared grid precipitation data — Climate Forecast System Reanalysis (CFSR) and WATCH Forcing Data methodology applied to ERA‐Interim (WFDEI) data — with Brazilian Weather Bureau (INMET) and Brazilian Water Agency (ANA) rain gauge data (n = 2027) for the period 1980–2010 in order to evaluate which grid data set better represents precipitation, and is thus more suitable for hydrological modelling of Brazilian water resources. We found that WFDEI outperformed CFSR according to three statistical indicators. We then applied and interpolated a simple bias correction to further improve WFDEI data before we used these data to model river discharge of the Tocantins catchment with the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT). Calibration (validation in parentheses; weighted averages of all gauges) had satisfactory statistical metrics: p‐factor = 0.52 (0.47); r‐factor = 0.84 (0.99); R² = 0.78 (0.71); bR² = 0.68 (0.47); NS = 0.70 (0.66); Pbias = ?4.5 (4.0). Finally, the calibrated SWAT model was used to assess the spatial distribution of the catchment's water resources. Annual green water flow (evapotranspiration) increased from the south‐east (640–840 mm yr^?1) to north‐west (1140–1440 mm) of the Tocantins catchment, while green water storage (soil water content) increased from south (330–1070 mm) to north (2180–3290 mm). Blue water (water yield) had a less clear pattern, with lower values in the south and the central borders of the catchment (20–560 mm) and higher values along the central axis and the north (920–1460 mm). Our analysis suggested that WFDEI was an accurate representation of Brazilian precipitation. For large catchments, we therefore recommend the use of WFDEI instead of sparse and often missing rain gauge data in modelling Brazilian water resources. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

How to improve the representation of hydrological processes in SWAT for a lowland catchment – temporal analysis of parameter sensitivity and model performance

Model diagnostic analyses help to improve the understanding of hydrological processes and their representation in hydrological models. A detailed temporal analysis detects periods of poor model performance and model components with potential for model improvements, which cannot be found by analysing the whole discharge time series. In this study, we aim to improve the understanding of hydrological processes by investigating the temporal dynamics of parameter sensitivity and of model performance for the Soil and Water Assessment Tool model applied to the Treene lowland catchment in Northern Germany. The temporal analysis shows that the parameter sensitivity varies temporally with high sensitivity for three groundwater parameters (groundwater time delay, baseflow recession constant and aquifer fraction coefficient) and one evaporation parameter (soil evaporation compensation factor). Whereas the soil evaporation compensation factor dominates in baseflow and resaturation periods, groundwater time delay, baseflow recession constant and aquifer fraction coefficient are dominant in the peak and recession phases. The temporal analysis of model performance identifies three clusters with different model performances, which can be related to different phases of the hydrograph. The lowest performance, when comparing six performance measures, is detected for the baseflow cluster. A spatially distributed analysis for six hydrological stations within the Treene catchment shows similar results for all stations. The linkage of periods with poor model performance to the dominant model components in these phases and with the related hydrological processes shows that the groundwater module has the highest potential for improvement. This temporal diagnostic analysis enhances the understanding of the Soil and Water Assessment Tool model and of the dominant hydrological processes in the lowland catchment. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Modelling blue and green water resources availability in Iran

Knowledge of the internal renewable water resources of a country is strategic information which is needed for long‐term planning of a nation's water and food security, among many other needs. New modelling tools allow this quantification with high spatial and temporal resolution. In this study we used the program Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) in combination with the Sequential Uncertainty Fitting program (SUFI‐2) to calibrate and validate a hydrologic model of Iran based on river discharges and wheat yield, taking into consideration dam operations and irrigation practices. Uncertainty analyses were also performed to assess the model performance. The results were quite satisfactory for most of the rivers across the country. We quantified all components of the water balance including blue water flow (water yield plus deep aquifer recharge), green water flow (actual and potential evapotranspiration) and green water storage (soil moisture) at sub‐basin level with monthly time‐steps. The spatially aggregated water resources and simulated yield compared well with the existing data. The study period was 1990–2002 for calibration and 1980–1989 for validation. The results show that irrigation practices have a significant impact on the water balances of the provinces with irrigated agriculture. Concerning the staple food crop in the country, 55% of irrigated wheat and 57% of rain‐fed wheat are produced every year in water‐scarce regions. The vulnerable situation of water resources availability has serious implications for the country's food security, and the looming impact of climate change could only worsen the situation. This study provides a strong basis for further studies concerning the water and food security and the water resources management strategies in the country and a unified approach for the analysis of blue and green water in other arid and semi‐arid countries. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hydrological responses to rainfall events including the extratropical cyclone Gloria in two contrasting Mediterranean headwaters in Spain; the perennial font del Regàs and the intermittent Fuirosos

Catchment hydrological responses to precipitation inputs, particularly during exceptionally large storms, are complex and variable, and our understanding of the associated runoff generation processes during those events is limited. Hydrological monitoring of climatically and hydrologically distinct catchments can help to improve this understanding by shedding light on the interplay between antecedent soil moisture conditions, hydrological connectivity, and rainfall event characteristics. This knowledge is urgently needed considering that both the frequency and magnitude of extreme precipitation events are increasing worldwide as a consequence of climate change. In autumn 2018, we installed water level sensors to monitor stream water and near-stream groundwater levels at two Mediterranean forest headwater catchments with contrasting hydrological regimes: Font del Regàs (sub-humid climate, perennial flow regime) and Fuirosos (semi-arid climate, intermittent flow regime). Both catchments are located in northeastern Spain, where the extratropical cyclone Gloria hit in January 2020 and left in ca. 65 h outstanding accumulated rainfalls of 424 mm in Font del Regàs and 230 mm in Fuirosos. During rainfall events of low mean intensity, hydrological responses to precipitation inputs at the semi-arid Fuirosos were more delayed and more variable than at the sub-humid Font del Regàs. We explain these divergences by differences in antecedent soil moisture conditions and associated differences in catchment hydrological connectivity between the two catchments, which in this case are likely driven by differences in local climate rather than by differences in local topography. In contrast, during events of moderate and high mean rainfall intensities, including the storm Gloria, precipitation inputs and hydrological responses correlated similarly in the two catchments. We explain this convergence by rapid development of hydrological connectivity independently of antecedent soil moisture conditions. The data set presented here is unique and contributes to our mechanistic understanding on how streams respond to rainfall events and exceptionally large storms in catchments with contrasting flow regimes.     

Performance of WASMOD and SWAT on hydrological simulation in Yingluoxia watershed in northwest of China

Two hydrological models with different structures and spatial capabilities are selected to simulate the runoff and actual evapotranspiration (AET) in Yingluoxia watershed, the upper reaches of Heihe River basin in northwest of China, to validate their performances in simulating hydrological processes. They are calibrated against the observed runoff at the watershed outlet (Yingluoxia station) for the period from 1990 to 1996 and validated for the period from 1997 to 2000. Results show that in terms of the simulated hydrograph against observations and the two selected objective functions, the conceptual, lumped Water And Snow balance MODeling system (WASMOD) with simple model structure could give the same, even better results than the semi‐distributed Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) with complex structure. Compared with other model applications to the watershed, simulation for monthly runoff made in this study seems better. With regard to AET, results calculated from both models are comparable as well. Both WASMOD and SWAT are proved to be suitable and satisfactory tools in simulating hydrological processes in the study area, although both of them have strengths and limitations in applications. WASMOD model may be one of the promising alternatives in hydrological modelling. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.