Evaluating the Soil Moisture Content Through Different Interpolation Methods

Abstract

Water is vital for the plant growth. An adequate amount of soil moisture content is required in order to increase plant growth and yield. The spatial distribution can be determined using different methods for different depths of soil moisture content. In this study the spatial distribution is created at four different soil depths (30, 60, 90 and 120 cm) using deterministic and stochastic methods. In order to determine the most appropriate methods, Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) and Mean Absolute Error (MAE) values were compared between the methods. The lowest RMSE (11.296) and MAE (7.821) values were obtained for 0-30 cm depth of soil moisture content by Ordinary Kriging method. As for the depth of 30-60 cm, the lowest RMSE (13.682) and MAE (8.444) values were obtained through Inverse Distance Weight (IDW). As for the depth of 60-90 cm, the lowest RMSE (17.767) and MAE (11.473) values were obtained through the Radial Basis Function (RBF). As for the depth of 90-120 cm, the lowest RMSE (20.24) and MAE (14.18) values were obtained through the IDW method. The soil moisture content maps have been prepared for 0-30 cm, 30-60 cm, 60-90 cm and 90-120 cm soil depths based on these methods.