Abstract
Climate change in the tropical Andes is a critical pressure for the sustainable water resource management and ecosystem conservation in the region. Among natural resources possibly affected by climate change, glaciers and wetlands are considered to provide a variety of ecological services and hydrological functions. In this study, for better understanding the ecological and hydrological significance of wetlands (bofedales), we analyzed satellite data (ALOS/AVNIR2) to detect the distribution and form of wetlands in the Tuni Lake catchment, Bolivia, where the water resources in the capital cities strongly depend on. We detected a large area of wetlands mainly located along the stream, especially in less glacierized sub-catchments. Besides, we found that relatively small-scale wetlands were distributed on hillslopes in high elevation (up to 5500 m above sea level), supplying water to downhill mainstreams. Hydrological effects of wetlands are discussed using our monitoring data on flow rate and precipitation, indicating the higher runoff ratio from the Tuni sub-catchment, which has a relatively large cover of wetlands.
