Estimation of the Water Balance Using Observed Soil Water in the Nebraska Sandhills
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Volume 15, Issue 1
Abstract
Analyzing the dynamic hydrologic conditions of the Sandhills is critical for water and range management and sustainability of the sandhills ecosystem as well as for dune stability. There are complex models available to quantify both surface and subsurface hydrological processes. However, we present in this study an application of a relatively simple model to arrive at best estimates of the water balance components. Using the Thornthwaite-Mather model, water balance components were estimated for four automated weather data network weather monitoring stations. Estimated averages of the water balance components suggested that mean annual precipitation of these four sites was only about 420 mm but water loss through plant evapotranspiration (ET) was 861 mm, with potential ET of about 1,214 mm. Our investigation shows that there was surplus of water between December and March and a deficit occurs at the start of the growing season in May and extends through senescence in September–October. This study also suggests that the High Plains aquifer possibly met the plant water requirement during this deficit period as well as during the soil water extraction period, from May through September.
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Acknowledgments
Our work is part of the Sandhills Biocomplexity Project and was funded by NSF (Award No. NSFDEB-0322067). This research was supported in part by the NSF Idaho EPSCoR Program and by the NSF under Award No. NSFEPS-0814387.
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Published In
Journal of Hydrologic Engineering
Volume 15 • Issue 1 • January 2010
Pages: 70 - 78
Copyright
© 2010 ASCE.
History
Received: Aug 15, 2008
Accepted: Jun 8, 2009
Published online: Jun 10, 2009
Published in print: Jan 2010
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