Investigating the Hydrological Characteristics of Kaduna River Basin

The water resource potential of the Kaduna River for use in irrigation development and water resource management has been studied. The water conveyance efficiencies of the river channels are very low that development of upstream reservoirs and downstream irrigation schemes will result in much water conveyance losses as the water flows downstream from these reservoirs. also, the runoff coefficient of the basin decreases from upstream to downstream catchments while the basin river have been observed to behave as gaining river and loosing river in their upstream and downstream ends respectively .Excessive loss of water by percolation below the root zones should be avoided by proper selection of irrigation water application method because of the low runoff coefficient of the lowland catchment areas. It is thus recommended that the development of the downstream of the basin for agriculture should be carried out with caution as a result of the great water ?conveyance losses and the semi-aridity shown by stream flow analysis.