The journal Hydrological Processes has recently been publishing a series of articles and commentaries in tribute to the estimable Keith Beven, the recently retired hydrologist from the University of Lancaster. One of his many fundamental contributions has consisted of drawing attention to the importance of, and making fundamental insight into, the phenomenon of macropores and preferential flows. One of those commentaries, by Markus Weiler, addressed these contributions as well as unresolved issues in understanding and simulating preferential flow.

No hillslope hydrologist, geomorphologist or pedologist would dispute the existence or frequent occurrence of preferential water flux in soils, or its importance in many cases at the scales of soil physics to hillslopes. However, Weiler points out that the observed differences in flow pathways at the pedon or hillslope scale are not necessarily detectable at the watershed scale. Does macropore flow matter at the catchment scale? Weiler's answer is yes, though he points out that many scientists believe otherwise.

From my student days onward, the aspects of nature that interested me most were the apparent anomalies--the things that were uncertain and unpredicted; that weren't like they were supposed to be. Nature contains both regular, ordered, predictable aspects, and irregular, disordered and unpredictable facets. As scientists we are taught to focus on the former and eliminate, ignore, or circumvent the latter.  But anyone who spends much time in the field knows that our planet is a source of infinite variety and ever-increasing uncertainty (because the more you learn, the more you realize that you don't know). But what always fascinated me was not that (for instance) the soils or streams or eastern North Carolina or central Kentucky fit, and can be predicted by, some broad pattern. It was the fact that you can often auger the ground at two spots less than a meter apart and find completely different soils, or walk or canoe a stream channel and easily find features not explained or predicted by the conventional scientific wisdom.

Axiomatic approaches to science and mathematics depend on an underlying set of statements, principles, or propositions that apply to all situations within the domain of study. The axioms run the gamut from undisputed universal laws to widely or even universally accepted but unproved or unprovable generalizations, to propositional stipulations adopted for analytical convenience or because they raise interesting questions.

Examples abound in mathematics and formal logic, and in science, engineering and technological applications of math and logic. Although it is only occasionally referred to as such, the laws of stratigraphy (details in any geology textbook) form an axiomatic approach to sedimentology, sedimentary geology, and related palaeoenvironmental studies. The laws of original horizontality, lateral continuity, superposition, and cross-cutting relationships are assumed in this approach to apply to all sedimentary deposits, and therefore form an axiomatic system for interpretation.

In 2011, a massive flood swept through the Lockyer Creek valley in southeast Queensland, Australia. The environmental, economic, and geomorphic impacts were immense, and Australian geoscientists immediately set out to document, understand, and contextualize them. The “Big Flood” project, led by Jacky Croke, has already produced 19 scientific journal articles, and they just this week went live with their web site, with numerous resources for scientists, managers, and the general public.

Floodwaters in Grantham, QLD, 2011 (http://www.thebigflood.com.au/whathappened.html)

The project has already produced some novel results with respect to flood geomorphology and hydrology, and is unique as far as I know with respect to direct efforts to integrate geoscience research with public policy, public education, and practical land and water resource management.

I recommend you check it out.

Those who have worked with soils are familiar with the Munsell system for measuring/assessing soil color, and with the many environmental clues soil color can give us. Now the Munsell company that produces the soil color chips, charts, and books we use in the field and lab has produced a fascinating and visually exciting celebration of soil and its colors, based on the centennial of the U.S. National Park system.

From Munsell's announcement:

Last year our geography department underwent an external review, as we do every five years or so. One of the recommendations was that we seek to integrate our Earth surface systems and physical geography program with political ecology. We happen to have a couple of political ecologists who understand and appreciate physical geography, and vice-versa. But I wonder what, at the subdisciplinary rather than the individual level,  we really have to offer each other.

Despite the word "ecology" and a tradition early on in political ecology (PE) of careful analysis of environmental change, contemporary PE appears to have very little general concern with ecology as a science (as opposed to ecology as a general reference to the environment, nature, or natural resources) or to other Earth and environmental sciences. This is not true of all PE or political ecologists, of course, and to the extent it is true, is not meant as a criticism of the field. Political ecologists are free to define and practice their field as they see fit, and it is not up to a geomorphologist to decide how central biophysical sciences should be.