Abstract for 2012 Oklahoma Water Research Symposium
Title of the Presentation: Soil Moisture-Based Drought Monitoring in Oklahoma
Authors:
Tyson E. Ochsner and Bethany L. Scott
Plant and Soil Sciences, Oklahoma State University
Bradley G. Illston
Oklahoma Climatological Survey, University of Oklahoma
Abstract:
Real-time drought monitoring is essential for early detection and adaptive management to mitigate the negative impacts of drought on communities and ecosystems in drought-prone locations like Oklahoma where the 2011 drought cost the state's economy over $1.5 billion from agricultural losses alone. Drought monitoring has been hampered by a lack of data on one crucial drought indicator: plant available water. Agricultural losses and, by extension, the economic impacts of drought, are strongly linked to plant available water. Plant available water (PAW) is the amount of soil moisture currently in the profile which is available for plant uptake. We have recently developed and launched a novel drought monitoring system for Oklahoma based on real-time PAW monitoring at >100 locations via the Oklahoma Mesonet. To our knowledge, this is the world’s first large-scale PAW monitoring system and offers unmatched potential for improving the use of soil moisture measurements in drought monitoring. The Oklahoma system may serve as a prototype for the development of soil moisture-based drought monitoring systems in other locations or at the national level. This presentation will describe the system and demonstrate some applications of the data for drought monitoring, prediction, and mitigation.
Presenter: Tyson Ochsner, Assistant Professor, Plant and Soil Sciences, Oklahoma State University, 368 Agricultural Hall, Stillwater, OK 74078, , 405-744-3627