The soil available water estimate through the fractal theory

Abstract

Numerous researches have applied the fractal geometry in the most diverse areas of scientific knowledge, having been shown very promising  in  the  estimation of  the physical properties of  soil,  water.  In this  sense,  we  aimed  at  this research estimate the water available in soil (AD) by the fractal  theory  based  on  two  physical properties  of  easy determination;  the water  retention curve  in  the soil and the particle size distributionl. To implement the proposed model,  parameters such as the fractal dimensions DSWRC and DPSD,  fractals representative measure of pore size distribution of particles and soil,  respectively, were defined as descriptive tools to estimate the curve of retention in the soil.  Soil samples were collected at three depths 0-20,  20-40 and 40-60 cm,  a total of 36 sampling points.  The comparison of results with the model indicated that the proposed model is simple in its use and is able to predict satisfactorily both the retention curve and  the available water in the soil.