How does this compare with Fig. It introduces some broader issues and concepts that will come up throughout the course. Read it as food for thought. Some important ideas from this reading are summarized below. Water is flushed through watersheds in storm events, but not completely.
Some water stays around for longer periods.
The river channel collects and focuses the precipitation that was delivered over the whole watershed land surface. The storage function of the watershed supports terrestrial ecology. The storage function also is what creates perennial streams, why streams don't dry up in the summer. Water is a medium that dissolves many components on the land surface and the soil, and delivers them to the stream. This is the chemical pathways function.