RUSWET-AGROCLIM
Multi-year Average of plant available soil moisture
gravimetric observations
and maps
Former Soviet Union
Data for agricultural fields with winter and spring
cereal crops
Konstantin
Vinnikov
Department of Meteorology,
University of Maryland
Alan Robock
Department of Environmental Sciences
Rutgers University
February 13, 1997
1. DESCRIPTION OF THE DATA SET
This data set is the output of a system for monitoring of soil
moisture at agricultural fields in the former Soviet Union.
The data used here are multi-year averages of plant available
water content in the soil layers 0-100 cm, 0-50 cm and 0-20 cm at
agricultural fields with winter cereal crops and spring cereal crops
(given separately) for 144 administrative districts of the Former
Soviet Union (FSU).
The measurements of six
stations (on the average) were used for each district with equal
weights.
The period of observations is
1946-1980 for the western part and 1927-1982 for the eastern part
of the FSU). All the initial data were retrieved and digitized from
Kelchevskaya (1989) and Zhukov
(1986).
SPATIAL DOMAIN: Agricultural regions of the Former Soviet Union.
SPATIAL RESOLUTION: On average, the area of each district is about
30,000 km2 (ranging from 10,000 to more than 100,000
km2).
TEMPORAL RESOLUTION: 10-11 days (3 measurements per month).
BASIS: Gravimetric soil moisture observations from about six hundred
agrometeorological stations.
These data are stored in the files Data/dat.*.
The * stands for the
variables w100, w50, w20, s100, s50, s20, where the character
"s" or "w" means that the data represent
agricultural fields with
"spring" or "winter" cereal crops.
The "20", "50," or "100" refer to
the depth of the soil layer in cm. Some misprints in the initial data
have been corrected.
The files Data/dat.* for w100, w50, w20, s100, s50 and s20 have the
Fortran format (x,i3,2x,f5.2,x,f6.2,x,i3,37f5.1). Each line in
these files contains:
the district conventional number [INTEGER (i3)],
the latitude (°N) and longitude (°E) of the center of
the district [REAL (f5.2,x,f6.2)],
37 values of plant available soil moisture in cm [REAL (37f5.1].
The first one is for December 28, the second value is for
January 8, etc., 3 times per month (on the 8th, 18th and
28th of each month); the last value is for December 28 (repeated).
The list of the names of the 140 administrative districts of the
Former Soviet Union,
their station numbers which are used instead of station names
in the GrADS station files, geographical coordinates, and areas
are given in the file Data/station.list.
2. GrADS FILES
The Fortran program Prog/readagro2.f is designed for reading the
initial data and for writing them as GrADS station files Grads/st.*.
The GrADS station data descriptor files have names Grads/st.*.ctl.
Station map files are Grads/sta.map.* .
The GrADS station data function OACRES with default parameters
was used to interpolate the initial data into a 1x1° grid,
using the GrADS exec Grads/run.write. The results of interpolation
were written as the GrADS gridded files Grads/grd.*. Their GrADS
descriptors are in Grads/grd.*.ctl.
3. CLIMATIC SOIL MOISTURE MAPS
Climatic maps of plant available soil moisture for the territory
of the Former Soviet Union can be displayed using GrADS using
the three execs: Grads/mp, Grads/mpc, Grads/mpc3.
The 'mp' exec displays in landscape mode both a contour map of
soil moisture for each of variables and the district data. At
the end of each exec, GrADS commands for drawing such maps for
each date of observation are attached as comments.
The 'mpc' exec displays in landscape mode a color shaded map of
soil moisture for the same variables. At the end of the exec,
the GrADS commands for drawing such maps for each date of observation
for each of the variables are attached as comments.
The 'mpc3' exec displays in portrait mode on one page three color
shaded maps of plant available water content in the soil layers
0-100 cm, 0-50 cm, and 0-20 cm. At
the end of the exec, the GrADS commands for drawing such maps
for each date of observation are attached as
comments.
You can use these GrADS files to write your own routines to display
and analyze the data in many different ways.
Acknowledgments. This work has been supported by NASA grant
NCC555 and NOAA grant NA56GPO212.
References
General description of Russian gravimetric soil moisture data
in English:
Entin, Jared, Alan Robock, Konstantin Y. Vinnikov, Shuang Qiu, Vladimir Zabelin,
Suxia Liu, A. Namkhai, and Ts. Adyasuren, 1999: Evaluation of Global Soil
Wetness Project soil moisture simulations. J. Meteorol. Soc. Japan, 77,
183-198. (Invited paper)
ABSTRACT
Robock, A., K. Y. Vinnikov, C. A. Schlosser, N. A. Speranskaya,
and Y. Xue, 1995: Use of midlatitude soil moisture and meteorological
observations to validate soil moisture simulations with biosphere
and bucket models. J. Climate, 8, 15-35.
ABSTRACT
Vinnikov, K. Y. and I. B. Yeserkepova, 1991. Soil moisture: empirical
data and model results. J. Climate, 4, 66-79.
Vinnikov, K. Y. , A. Robock, N. A. Speranskaya, and C. A. Schlosser,
1996: Scales of temporal and spatial variability of midlatitude
soil moisture. J. Geophys. Res., 101, 7163-7174.
ABSTRACT
,
PDF file
Recommended Russian publications and reference books:
Kelchevskaya, L. S., 1983: Soil moisture of the European part
of USSR. Gidrometeoizdat, Leningrad, 183 pp. (In Russian).
Kelchevskaya, L. S., Ed., 1989: Mean long term stores of productive
water under winter and early spring cereals in districts, regions,
republics and economic regions. Reference book. Vol. 2. Urals,
Western and Eastern Siberia, Kazakhstan, Central Asia. Gidrometeoizdat,
Leningrad, 65 pp. (in Russian).
Meshcherskaya, A. V., N. A. Boldyreva, and N. D. Shapaeva, 1982:
District average plant available soil water storage and the depth
of snow cover. Statistical analysis and its usage (some examples).
Gidrometeoizdat, Leningrad, 243 pp. (In Russian).
Zhukov, V. A., Ed., 1986: Mean long term stores of productive
water under winter and early spring cereals in districts, regions,
republics and economic regions. Reference book. Vol. 1. European
part of the USSR. Gidrometeoizdat, Leningrad, 122 pp. (in Russian).
For further information, please contact:
| Dr. Konstantin Ya. Vinnikov | OR
| Prof. Alan Robock |
| Department of Meteorology |
| Department of Environmental Sciences |
| University of Maryland | |
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey |
| College Park, Maryland 20742 USA |
| New Brunswick, New Jersey 08901 USA |
| Phone: (301) 405-5382 | |
Phone: (732) 932-9478 |
| Fax: (301) 314-9482 | | Fax:
(732) 932-8644
|
| E-mail: kostya@atmos.umd.edu |
| E-mail: robock@envsci.rutgers.edu |
TO DOWNLOAD THE DATA,
get the complete contents of each of the directories and subdirectories,
click
here.
Prepared by Alan Robock (robock@envsci.rutgers.edu)
Last updated on August 8, 2004