Contribution of Non-Rainfall Water Input to Surface Soil Moisture in a Tropical Dry Forest

Abstract

Non-rainfall water input to surface soil moisture is essential to ecosystems, especially in dry climates, where a water deficit may persist for several months. Quantifying the impact of water gains by soil moisture at night will help to understand vegetation dynamics in dry regions. The objective of this study was to evaluate the non-rainfall water contribution to soil moisture content at the soil surface and how it minimizes the water stress on plants with predominantly surface roots. The experiment was conducted in a low-latitude, semiarid environment with a dry tropical forest regenerating for 42 years. The soil moisture and soil temperature were measured at one-minute intervals from June 2019 to August 2019 using four capacitive humidity sensors and thermometers, installed at depths of 5 and 10 cm. the soil moisture increased significantly (p < 0.05) during the night at both depths from June to August, when there was no rainfall. There is a definite contribution of nightly gains to alleviate vegetation water stress during the dry months. These results show the importance of dew for water availability and for dry tropical forests species in the months of water deficit.