Testing New Approaches to Share Soil Moisture Information in the Upper Missouri River Basin

South Dakota State University and NOAA’s National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS) invite you to learn about a new tool for monitoring drought in the Upper Missouri River Basin (UMRB): UMRB Soil Moisture and Snowpack Maps. Presenters will highlight an experimental dashboard for soil moisture and snowpack station data in the region (Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming), hosted on Drought.gov. The presentation will be followed by time for Q&A. Professionals involved in drought monitoring, soil science, agriculture, natural resources, hydrology, and climate are encouraged to attend.

These new UMRB Soil Moisture and Snowpack Maps provide an approach for communicating soil moisture values in a format that accounts for soil texture and does not rely on an extended period of record for interpretation. As such, the maps could provide a template for other networks seeking to convey soil moisture information from a limited data record.

About the Tool:

NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) and South Dakota State University developed the UMRB Soil Moisture and Snowpack Maps as part of the NIDIS-led UMRB Data Value Study, which is a component of the larger, multi-agency UMRB Soil Moisture and Snowpack Project. The project was funded by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act to expand soil moisture and snowpack monitoring in the UMRB following multiple catastrophic flood and drought events in the region between 2011 and 2017. 

For more information, please contact Laura Edwards (laura.edwards@sdstate.edu).