The timing and magnitude of storm flow responses are an important environmental issue due to their causal effects of rapid and concentrated transport of water and solutes. For salinity management in the Australian landscape, knowledge of rainfall responses at the hillslope scale is crucial, but still not understood. In our previous research (Deurer et al. 2004) we reported that distinct flow paths exist as a higher-order secondary structure (drainage network) within a soil profile. This drainage network was derived from connectivity patterns of macroscopic hydraulic properties and preferential flow behaviour within a soil profile, which could be explained using a hierarchy of soil hydraulic properties. In this study we demonstrate that a similar higher order structure, or percolation backbone could operate at the hillslope scale, based on differences in soil properties. With numerical simulations, using TOPOG, we demonstrate that such a system could explain observations of rapid storm response flow in streams and runoff. We further investigate the effect of variations in soil hydraulic properties in the top and subsoil and topology of the drainage network on the hydrograph shape and timing. As was the case at the soil profile scale, the drainage network is the main determinant of the water transport after an initial distribution zone. However the interaction between topography and the network is complex and is dependent on landscape location and soil hydraulic property variations.