Fusion of data from multiple soil sensors for the delineation of water holding capacity zones

Abstract

The paper aims to implement an on-line multi-sensor platform and data fusion approach for the delineation of management zones for site-specific irrigation. This is performed by simultaneous measurement of soil moisture content (MC), organic carbon (OC), plasticity index, clay content and bulk density. A multiple linear regression analysis was used to derive zones of water holding capacity (WHC) and estimate available water content. Four classes of WHC were derived, with normalised ranges of 0–0.25, 0.26–0.50 and 0.51–0.75 and 0.76–1, which were designated respectively as low, medium, high and very high WHC.