Articles | Volume 19, issue 1
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-19-423-2025
https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-19-423-2025
Research article
 | 
29 Jan 2025
Research article |  | 29 Jan 2025

Separating snow and ice melt using water stable isotopes and glacio-hydrological modelling: towards improving the application of isotope analyses in highly glacierized catchments

Tom Müller, Mauro Fischer, Stuart N. Lane, and Bettina Schaefli

Data sets

Water stable isotope, temperature and electrical conductivity dataset (snow, ice, rain, surface water, groundwater) from a high alpine catchment (2019-2021). Tom Müller https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7529792

Stream discharge, stage, electrical conductivity & temperature dataset from Otemma glacier forefield, Switzerland (from July 2019 to October 2021) T. Müller and F. Miesen https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6202732

Weather dataset from Otemma glacier forefield, Switzerland (from 14 July 2019 to 18 November 2021) Tom Müller https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6106778

Model code and software

Combined isotopic and glacio-hydrological model developped for the Otemma glacierized catchment. T. Müller https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13963844

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Short summary
Based on extensive field observations in a highly glacierized catchment in the Swiss Alps, we develop a combined isotopic and glacio-hydrological model. We show that water stable isotopes may help to better constrain model parameters, especially those linked to water transfer. However, we highlight that separating snow and ice melt for temperate glaciers based on isotope mixing models alone is not advised and should only be considered if their isotopic signatures have clearly different values.