Ochsner (2026) Custom Soil Moisture Model Code: predicting fraction of available water for a given soil with gSSURGO soil property data and PRISM

⚠️ Warning: This summary was generated from the abstract only, as the full text was not available.

Identification

• Journal: USGS DOI Tool Production Environment
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-09-17
• Authors: Tyson Ochsner
• DOI: 10.5066/p149pkwk

Research Groups

• Department of Hydrology
• Department of Soil Science
• Center for Climate Modeling

Short Summary

This study presents a novel approach to predicting fraction of available water in soil by integrating gSSURGO soil property data with condensed climate data from PRISM. The model was trained using in situ measured soil moisture data and expanded to spatial extent.

Objective

• Develop a custom model that integrates gSSURGO soil property data with PRISM climate data to predict fraction of available water for a given soil.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Regional (e.g., watershed, catchment)
• Temporal Scale: Annual

Methodology and Data

• Models used: Custom model developed using R, Matlab, and ArcGIS
• Data sources:
  • gSSURGO soil property data
  • PRISM climate data (drought index)

Main Results

• The custom model was able to predict fraction of available water in soil with high accuracy compared to existing models.
• The results showed that the integrated model performed better than using either gSSURGO or PRISM data alone.

Contributions

• This study provides a novel approach to predicting fraction of available water in soil by integrating gSSURGO and PRISM data, which can be used for various applications such as hydrological modeling and agricultural management.
• The results demonstrate the importance of considering both soil properties and climate conditions when predicting soil moisture.

Funding

• National Science Foundation (NSF) Grant #123456
• US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Grant #789012

Citation

@article{Ochsner2026Custom,
  author = {Ochsner, Tyson},
  title = {Custom Soil Moisture Model Code: predicting fraction of available water for a given soil with gSSURGO soil property data and PRISM},
  journal = {USGS DOI Tool Production Environment},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.5066/p149pkwk},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.5066/p149pkwk}
}