Large hydrological systems aggregate compositionally different waters derived from a variety of pathways. In the case of continental‐scale rivers, such aggregation occurs noticeably at confluences between tributaries. Here we explore how such aggregation can affect solute concentration‐discharge (C‐Q) relationships and thus obscure the message carried by these relationships in terms of weathering properties of the Critical Zone. We build up a simple model for tributary mixing to predict the behavior of C‐Q relationships during aggregation. We test a set of predictions made in the context of the largest world's river, the Amazon. In particular, we predict that the C‐Q relationships of the rivers draining heterogeneous catchments should be the most “dilutional” and should display the widest hysteresis loops. To check these predictions, we compute 10 day‐periodicity time ser...