Analyzing and Projecting Soil Moisture and Cone Penetrability Variations in Forest Soils

Abstract

This article details how forest soil moisture content (MC) and subsequent resistances to cone penetration (referred below as Cone Index, CI) vary by daily weather, season, topography, site and soil properties across eleven harvest blocks in northwestern New Brunswick. The MC-and CI-affecting soil variables refer to density, texture, organic matter content, coarse fragment content, and topographic position (i.e., elevation, and the seasonally affected cartographic depth-to-water (DTW) pattern). The harvest blocks were transect-sampled inside and outside their wood-forwarding tracks at varying times throughout the year. In detail, 61% of the pore-filled moisture content (MC PS) determinations inside and outside the tracks could be related to topographic position, coarse fragments, bulk density, and forest cover type specifications. In addition, 40% of the CI variations could be related to soil depth, MC PS , and block-specific cover type. Actual versus model-projected uncertainties amounted to ΔMC PS ≤ ± 15% and ΔCI ≤ ± 0.5 MPa, 8 times out of 10. Block-centered MC and CI projections were obtained through: 1) daily hydrological modelling using daily precipitation and air temperature weather-station records nearest each block, and 2) digitally mapped variations in soil properties, elevation, DTW and forest cover type, done at 10 m resolution.

Estimation of the Level of Recreational Transformation of Public Green Spaces by Indicators of Soil Penetration Resistance

“…Опір проникненню ґрунту як показник ущільнення ґрунту суттєво залежав від кількох змінних ґрунту, таких як уміст води, щільність ґрунту, органічні речовини, текстура та структура ґрунту (Lomeling & Lasu, 2015). Через місцевості проникність ґрунту змінюється внаслідок зміни вмісту вологи в ґрунті, зміни типу ґрунту, глибини, текстури, вмісту грубих осколків і органічних речовин та експозиції гірських порід, зміни різних типів механічного впливу, спричиненого людиною на ґрунт (Jones & Arp, 2019).…”

Soil Trafficability Forecasting

“…Details regarding the wood-forwarding operations within the four harvest blocks chosen for this study are presented in Figure 1 & Figure 2 by location, and in Table 2 by block-specific attributes. These blocks are a subset of the 11 blocks used by Jones and Arp (2019) for their on-and off-track soil moisture and CI study. Figure 1.…”

“…The generation of these data was described by Jones et al (2018). (Table 2) in the fall of 2014, as described in Jones and Arp (2019). The samples were analyzed for texture (sand, silt and clay %), coarse fragments (%), organic matter content (%), and bulk density (g/cm 3 ).…”

“…The cross-terrain MC PS projections were originally based on (Vega-Nieva et al, 2009;Jones & Arp, 2019): (2) with log 10 DTW FIA referring to the logarithm of the rasterized depth-to-water index adjusted to the upslope flow initiation area (FIA) at the time of wood forwarding. In addition, OM DSM is the digitally derived soil organic matter raster (Furze, 2018; in %), DEM is elevation in meters, Track = 1 for ruts and 0 otherwise, and HW = 1 refers to locations dominated by hardwood, otherwise HW = 0.…”

“…3) Selecting four of the eleven harvest blocks described in Jones and Arp (2019) for detailed analysis; this involved assessing wood-forwarding tracks across two shelterwood cutting blocks and across two commercial thinning blocks in Northern and Central New Brunswick, Canada.…”