Re: Thermocouple psychrometers for retention curves?

[John Manwaring]

Evan Christen asked:

> Has anyone out there used a thermocouple psychrometer to develop soil water
> retention curves for soils ? I am considering purchasing one for this
> purpose but am concerned about the small sample size, about 1cm3.

    We have done this recently, although we used data from ~40 separate
psychrometers at
different depths to come up with a generalized relationship, for the reason you
noted--such a small volume of soil is sampled.

John Manwaring
Research Associate
Plant Ecophysiology
Utah State University