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Contribution of dew to the water budget of a grassland area in the Netherlands
Author(s) -
Jacobs Adrie F. G.,
Heusinkveld Bert G.,
Wichink Kruit Roy J.,
Berkowicz Simon M.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
water resources research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.863
H-Index - 217
eISSN - 1944-7973
pISSN - 0043-1397
DOI - 10.1029/2005wr004055
Subject(s) - dew , environmental science , precipitation , dew point , grassland , hydrology (agriculture) , vegetation (pathology) , standard deviation , atmospheric sciences , meteorology , geography , geology , mathematics , agronomy , statistics , condensation , medicine , geotechnical engineering , pathology , biology
The annual amount of dew input to the water budget in the midlatitudes is mostly neglected, possibly because direct dew measurements are very difficult and time‐consuming. As the Netherlands has a very high frequency of dew events, a grassland area was selected to determine whether dew input could be significant. The study site is situated within the Wageningen University meteorological station. Dew measurement experiments were carried out in 2004. Data were used to verify a surface energy dew model, which was then applied to an 11‐year data set. A mean annual dew amount of 37 mm was obtained with a standard deviation of 8 mm, while the mean annual precipitation was 830 mm with a standard deviation of 200 mm. Dew contributed about 4.5% of the mean annual precipitation. The average number of dew nights per year was 250 (70%) with a standard deviation of 25 nights. This frequency significantly affects leaf wetness and possible vegetation diseases.