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Contact: Robert Zamora
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NOAA's Hydrometeorology Testbed (HMT) has deployed soil moisture observing networks in the watersheds of the Russian River and North Fork (NF) of the American River in Northern California, and the San Pedro River in southeastern Arizona. These networks were designed to serve the combined needs of the hydrological, meteorological, agricultural, and climatological communities for observations of soil moisture on time scales that range from minutes to decades.
The networks are a major component of the HMT program to help focus research and development efforts on key hydrological and meteorological forecast problems. These forecast problems are not only of interest to the National Weather Service (NWS), but they also play a crucial role in providing input to water managers who work at the national, state, and local government levels to provide water for human consumption, agricultural, and other needs.
The HMT soil moisture networks have been specifically designed to capture the changes in soil moisture that are associated with heavy precipitation events and runoff from snowpack during the melt season. This paper describes the strategies used to site the networks and sensors as well as the selection, testing, and calibration of the soil moisture probes. In addition, two illustrative examples of the data gathered by the networks are shown.