HYPRESCZ - database of soil hydrophysical properties in the Czech Republic

Abstract

Miháliková M., Matula S., Doležal F. (2013) The database of soil hydrophysical properties in the Czech Republic called HYPRESCZ was created. It is based on the European database HYPRES, HYdraulic PRoperties of European Soils, and follows its structure with few modifications. It collects the available data from the Czech Republic from which pedotransfer functions (PTFs) for the estimation of soil hydrophysical properties from easily available soil properties can be derived and 2101 database entries were collected. The entries have different quality of data, out of the total number of entries 707 entries were applicable to PTFs derivation for the estimation of soil water retention curves (SWRCs). After elimination of replicates, finally 159 unique soil horizons (arable land only) were used for PTFs derivation. The parametric continuous pedotransfer functions for estimation of SWRCs in the Czech Republic were derived within this study and are based on Wösten's model. The retention curves were estimated using both these newly derived PTFs and Wösten's original model, which was derived for European soils in general. The uncertainty of estimation was evaluated, employing the root mean squared error (RMSE) and the coefficient of determination (R 2 ) comparing the PTF-estimated and the directly fitted retention curves. The reliability of the newly derived PTFs for Czech soils was higher (RMSE = 0.059 cm 3 /cm 3 and R 2 = 71%) compared to Wösten's general PTFs (RMSE = 0.11 cm 3 /cm 3 and R 2 = 36%).

Analysis of Water Retention Capacity for Select Forest Soils in Poland

“…Analyzing the empirical 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 Table 2, it can be concluded that in the case of the forest soils occurring in the pine and spruce ecosystems the bulk density (ρ b ), specific density (ρ p ), organic matter content (C org ), sand fraction from 1 to 0.1 mm (S a ), silt fraction from 0.1 to 0.02 mm (S i ), and content of particles smaller than 0.02 mm (S pl ) had essential impact on soil water retention characteristics. The obtained results in the forms of empirical equations generally are in agreement with data presented in the literature [5,15,29]. However, it should be stressed that forecasting of the field capacity, commonly assumed at pF=2, which is a very important soil moisture status [6,32], the S pl fraction content was required.…”

“…In order to find relationships between soil water retention characteristics, expressed in tabular form (moisture content values at predefined pressure head) or continuous, using an analytical description (i.e. Van Genuchten) [12], and the easy measurable physical features, linear multiple regression analysis is often used [13][14][15].…”

Thermal properties of representative soils of the Czech Republic

“…Soil hydraulic properties (i.e. soil-water retention and hydraulic conductivity curves) may be estimated for instance from some basic soil properties using pedotransfer functions (Wösten et al 1999) modified for Czech soils by Miháliková et al (2013). Soil thermal properties (volumetric heat capacity and thermal conductivity) may be also estimated.…”

Application of k-Nearest code to the improvement of class pedotransfer functions and countrywide Field Capacity and Wilting Point maps

“…The available soil water retention data from the HY-PRESCZ database (Matula et al 2010;Miháliková et al 2013) were made more complete with the help of the k-NN technique as implemented in the k-Nearest code (Nemes et al 2008). The code was employed for estimation of FC and WP in terms of volumetric soil water contents at pressure heads of -50 cm and -15 000 cm, respectively.…”

“…The data contained in the HYPRESCZ database (Matula et al 2010;Miháliková et al 2013) were used in this study. The HYPRESCZ is the database of soil hydrophysical properties in the CR and its structure is based on that of the HYPRES (HYdraulic PRoperties of European Soils) database (Wösten et al 1999).…”