Computer Simulation of Clinch Mountain Drainage Networks

Clinch Mountain, in southwestern Virginia and northeastern Tennessee, is a long homoclinal ridge with a dip angle that varies along the strike. The base width and height both decrease with increasing dip, so that the mountain provides an excellent example of a system with uniform lithology and structure but varying structural parameters. Various properties of the stream networks on both the dip and scarp slopes were measured and analyzed as a function of dip angle. A random-walk headward-growth model of stream network development was used to simulate the Clinch Mountain network; the criterion for a successful simulation was that the simulatedand actual networks should have statistical geometrical similarity. Satisfactory results were obtained if both the reduced width (product of width and drainage density) and the number of outlets per unit length were assigned as input parameters.