05/15/13, Boise State University, Dept of Geosciences, Hydrologic Sciences, Jim McNamara Research Director, 
Pam Aishlin Site Maintenance and Data Management


Data provided herein is for soil instrumentatin site MHS (mid-high elevation, south-facing) of Dry Creek Experimental Watershed, Boise, Idaho.


DATA STREAM:    

1. Four pits were emplaced by graduate student Toni Smith, Boise State University in 2007.   


2. Data collection and site maintenance is provided by Boise State University Hydrologic Sciences.
 

3. Data files collected via Campbell Scientific datalogger are quality checked and post processed 
for gapfilling, noise filtering and/or corrected according to established instrument calibrations. 
 

SITE NOTES:

Soil moisture and soil temperature measurement site.  Site includes four soil pits with sensors at multiple depths, 
2, 15, 30 cm and near bedrock. Pits are located at 3 m quadrilateral separation.  Bedrock sensor depths for 
pits 1-4, accordingly, are 70,59,60,50 cm though bedrock depth is indicated as 80,66,87,70, accordingly.  
This site is south-facing, located in the Shingle Creek catchment of DCEW.  It is one of 8 soil sites established as 
north-south facing paired sites in 2007, 2008. Geology at this location is Sandy loam over fractured granodiorite. 
Site is grass-shrub vegetated and moderately steep. 


DATA/INSTRUMENT NOTES:

Sensors initially installed are Decagon ECH2O EC-TM soil moisture and soil temperature sensors. Sensor precision is 
0.001 for volumetric water content (cm3/mc3) and  0.1 celsius for soil temperature.  Sensors were calibrated in-lab at Boise
State University by Toni Smith, in cooperation with Decagon technical support, in accordance with manual specifications
and expected sandy loam soil.  An appropriate datalogger program was written  by Toni Smith in collaboration with Decagon 
technical support. 

An ultrasonic snow depth sensor was installed fall 2012.



DATA POSTPROCESSING: 
Data gaps and NAN values are filled w/ -6999 as a nodata value.  
Algorithms are used to remove obviously erroneous values, such as negative moisture values and temperature above expected range
of -10 to 40 celsius, as well as obviously 'stuck' values. In some years, these algorithms were not applied in order to preserve 
trends such as occur with soil moisture into the negative range due to sensor calibration offset. 



ANNUAL ERRORS/GAPS/UPDATES:

Data collection initiated March 16, 2008, initially 10 minute data. 

2012 - 06/20/12 site visits to upload new usd program; gap 6/13/12-6/20/12, usd program added/adjusted 6/13 and 
6/20 2012. 

2013  Operational
2014  Low battery, gaps late December
2015  Gaps likely during winter months, Jan, Dec. removed telemetry radio.
2016  Data gap from 5/4 to 10/9 due to power disconnect, loose wire.  
2017  Half of the sensors are operational.