Core Ideas
Ground‐penetrating radar response changes with electrical conductivity and organic matter of same soils.
Ground‐penetrating radar responses changes with soil temperatures diurnally and precipitation seasonally.
Ground‐penetrating radar response is strongly related to clay content and daily volumetric water content of soils.
Irrespective of clay content, response varies with electrical conductivity, cation exchange capacity or clay‐mineral types.
The impacts of soils' heterogeneity due to temporal (ET)‐ and seasonal (ES) changes from minute variations in precipitation (as rain, ice, and snow) and air temperatures (P+TA) on the ground‐penetrating radar (GPR) responses (RGPR) are not rigorously tested. We aimed to understand how environmental changes (ET and ES) can be accountable to alter RGPR and help relate to real‐time (TR) soil environmental status. Soil moisture (volumetric water content, VWC), temperature (TS), and electrical conductivity (EC) in every 30 min were recorded by soil sensors daily in different seasons to match the diurnal and seasonal changes. Readings of GPR alerts from six soil types of various GPR‐suitability classes were recorded two to three times daily. Changes in P+TA, which changed physicochemical soil properties (PCSP) temporally and impacted RGPR up to 76%. The RGPR, which was negatively corelated with clay (R = –0.89) and organic matter (OM) (R = –0.91) percentages, remained low in soils when cation exchange capacity (CEC) is also high. The RGPR which were pronounced after rain, during fall, in sandy soils, and in case of neutral to basic pH impacted by narrow‐range VWC variations on sandy but broad range on clay soils. Soils of same clay percent and similar OM acted differently if they have differential CEC and pH values. Ninety‐six percent of RGPR, which is impacted by electric resistances and bonding nature of water and soils, were explainable if interactions of clay, OM, and VWC at TR are considered. Future insights on influences from freeze–thaw cycles and specific silica‐mineral types of soils are required.
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