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Spatial Variability of Steady‐State Infiltration Rates as a Stochastic Process
Author(s) -
Sisson J. B.,
Wierenga P. J.
Publication year - 1981
Publication title -
soil science society of america journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.836
H-Index - 168
eISSN - 1435-0661
pISSN - 0361-5995
DOI - 10.2136/sssaj1981.03615995004500040005x
Subject(s) - transect , autocorrelation , mathematics , infiltration (hvac) , soil science , statistics , environmental science , geology , physics , meteorology , oceanography
Steady‐state infiltration rates were measured in a field plot with infiltrometers of 5‐, 25‐, and 127‐cm inside diameter. Measurements were made with the three ringsizes along five parallel transects, spaced 125 cm apart. The infiltrometers were placed adjacent to each other along each transect (i.e., one hundred twenty‐five 5‐cm rings, twenty‐five 25‐cm rings, and five 127‐cm rings per transect). Infiltration rates were found to be lognormally distributed for all ringsizes and autocorrelated for the 5‐cm ringsize. The 5‐cm data showed that a large fraction of the water infiltrated through a small fraction of the plot area. Autocorrelation functions were determined and power spectrums computed. A first‐order autoregressive process was found to describe the 5‐cm data, and variances of samples composited along a transect agreed with sample variances. The variances for the 25‐ and 127‐cm infiltrometers were compared with sample variances, assuming a simple two‐dimensional autocovariance function. Agreement was found for the 127‐cm rings, but not for the 25‐cm rings.