This study investigated the possibility of three approaches in determination of soil moisture in the root zone. The aim of the study was to contribute to the development of soil moisture monitoring methods to better help crop best management practices. / Two fields were examined, one at the Macdonald Campus of McGill University and the other near St. Jean-sur-Richelieau. Three approaches were used; (1) a hand-held hyper-spectral sensor (350-2500 nm), (2) a Geonics RTM EM-38 conductivity meter and, (3) gravimetric soil moisture sampling. / The first experiment (at St. Jean-sur-Richelieu) investigated the possibility of monitoring soil moisture with the EM_38, in the presence of field elevation and soil texture. The second experiment (at Macdonald Campus) investigated the possibility of using hyper-spectral sensor data for determination of soil characteristics in the root zone, in the presence of such factors as (a) irrigation (main treatment), (b) nitrogen (sub-treatment), and (c) weed control (sub-sub-treatment). Statistical regression analyses and Artificial Neural Network models were used to select the best waveband region for determination of soil root zone moisture. / The coefficients of determination obtained by the statistical analyses ranged from 0.75 to 0.94. The wavebands most frequently identified by these analyses ranged from 1100 nm-1900 nm. / The performances of the ANN training models were considered acceptable (R2 from 0.6 to 0.8). The lack of sufficient data greatly impacts this approach.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.84027 |
| Date | January 2005 |
| Creators | Erindi-Kati, Anila |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Science (Department of Bioresource Engineering.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 002271889, proquestno: AAIMR22719, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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