BACKGROUND  Establish a minimum of 100 new soil A COOPERATIVE FRAMEWORK moisture recording sites through Quantifying even small changes in water partnerships with cooperators. No one entity can ensure sustained availability would be significant for  Provide an information system for operation and success of a statewide Montanans who make decisions that accessing and visualizing historic, real- and soil moisture information balance risks and costs. In 2014 there time and forecasted data. network. With this in mind the MCO is were 27,800 farm operations across ~60 embracing a cooperative context that will million acres of land that contributed to 4.2 Initially this effort will focus on agricultural address a diverse set of information needs. billion dollars of Montana’s revenue. and rangeland areas of Montana. By the The MCO will extend a significant cost Agriculture is such a large Montana fall of 2016 the MCO will have 30 stations reduction on science grade stations to industry that any increase in efficiency from located across Montana as part of the cooperators and will install them as funds more accurate weather and soil moisture Montana Research and Economic become available. We are currently testing information can translate into several Development Initiative (MREDI). the accuracy of 3 manufacturers against million dollars in statewide savings each “gold standard” National Weather Service year. Whether for irrigated and dryland Over time the MCO will respond to many stations. The MCO will also ensure that agriculture, grazing, water supply, or outstanding requests for additional stations data are quality controlled and accessible natural resource management too few in cooperation with local watershed groups, in real time through web services and stations exist to measure meteorological NGO’s, private sector, tribal, state, and smart devices. An annual service fee and soil moisture information at the same federal partners. ($400) will cover data transmission fees, location to support decision-making based computing infrastructure, and maintenance upon local conditions. costs. Simply stated, the MCO will not profit from the stations or maintenance of CONCEPT the network beyond the inherent value in facilitating an expansive and publically The Montana Climate Office (MCO) is available soil moisture and climate leading the development of a cooperative information network for Montanans. statewide soil moisture and meteorological information system. It is designed to support decision-making in agriculture, range and forested watershed contexts. This network will add new remote sites and integrate existing cooperator networks to develop the first statewide soil-climate network. Permanent weather stations that are operationally downloaded each day in the MCO The Montana will: database and the sites for initial MT Mesonet location (green squares).  Combine information from existing data networks

STANDARD SITE CONFIGURATION DATA MANAGEMENT USES OF SOIL WATER & CLIMATE DATA Measurement* Description Resource management issues for which long term soil-climate information is

Precipitation Tipping bucket rain

n

o

i t

a needed include: gauge t Air Temperature Shielded thermistor S  To monitor drought onset, duration Relative Humidity Aspirated thin film and magnitude All stations are solar powered and will capacitance type  To facilitate estimates of crop allow users to check the data from virtually irrigation demand and irrigation anywhere in the world. Data are scheduling Speed and Propeller type transmitted from the data-logger’s internal  Planting and harvesting scheduling Direction anemometer module to MCO’s secure server via cellular  To predict the long term sustainability Solar Radiation communication. Quality assurance and of cropping systems, and watershed control checks are applied and the data are Barometric Silicon capacitive health available to the user to access, monitor Pressure pressure sensor To monitor and predict changes range and download at any time. Transmitted  and forest land productivity in relation Soil Moisture Volumetric water data are backed up in the data-logger’s to soil moisture-temperature changes content using Time memory and at the MCO to provide an Domain extra layer of redundancy and protection.  To predict and mitigate pest and Reflectometers at 4”, disease outbreaks 16” and 32” depths.  To predict changes in runoff that Soil Temperature Encapsulated affect flooding and control structures thermistor at 4”, 16”  To verify and ground-truth satellite and 32” depths. and soil moisture model information Soil Water Amount of solutes in  To facilitate natural resource Electrical soil water using at 4”, decisions for prescribed burning. Conductivity 16” and 32” depths.  To develop new soil moisture accounting methods and risk Normalized Crop greenness and a assessments. Difference proxy for vegetation

Vegetation Index health and productivity Digital Photos Photos of site DATA DELIVERY conditions by an onboard camera. Data is delivered in multiple formats such *All sensor measurements are reported at as maps and graphs that dynamically least hourly report the latest content. This includes the ability to rapidly summarize point and

gridded data by state, county, watershed or ownership unit. Finally a smartphone University of Montana application will provide users with a mobile 32 Campus Drive tool for viewing data in the field. Missoula, MT 59812 [email protected]