Throughfall in the terra firme forest of Western Amazonia

Throughfall measurements were made under primary terra firme rainforest in the Rio Pichis valley, in the Upper Amazon Basin of Peru. Based on 214 precipitation events over nearly 18 months, throughfall was estimated to be 83.1±8.8% of gross precipitation. Regression analysis of all events revealed that gross precipitation is the only significant explanatory variable; the use of one-burst events does not significantly improve the regression relationship. Gross precipitation is, however, a poor predictor of throughfall for small rainfall events. The two forest structure parameters, canopy capacity, S, and free throughfall coefficient, p, were determined to be 1.3±0.2 mm and 0.32±0.18 mm. Rainfall intensity was found to influence these parameters. New methods which attempt to minimize the influence of meteorologic variables are used to estimate the potential values of these canopy parameters.