Response to comments on an article entitled 'A geochemical survey of spring water from the main Ethiopian rift valley, southern Ethiopia: implications for well-head protection' by McKenzie et al., Hydrogeology Journal (2001) 9:265–272

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We thank Seifu Kebede and Yves Travi for their comments regarding our paper: "A geochemical survey of spring water from the main Ethiopian rift valley, southern Ethiopia: implications for well-head protection" (McKenzie et al. 2001). However, it appears that Kebede and Travi misinterpreted the intent of our paper, which was to address how local isotopic variations and changes in shallow spring-water chemistry in southern Ethiopia may be used to address issues related to well-head protection. Kebede and Travi criticize us for not citing the larger body of literature on the isotopic composition of waters elsewhere in Ethiopia. Because our paper was written as a local isotopic and geochemical case study, we are perplexed why Kebede and Travi suggest that we should cite isotopic and geochemical composition of waters from lakes, boreholes, and thermal springs from northern and central Ethiopia in different physiographic and climate regions. Much of the literature to which Kebede and Travi refer is not pertinent to the intent and content of our paper, and some of it is not easily found in normal channels of searching for peer-reviewed earth science literature. Kebede and Travi even suggested we cite data from ongoing unpublished research ( IAEA TC project ETH/OO6 2002). …