title: Screening variability and change of soil moisture under wide-ranging climate conditions: Snow dynamics effects.
abstract: Soil moisture influences and is influenced by water, climate, and ecosystem conditions, affecting associated ecosystem services in the landscape. This paper couples snow storage-melting dynamics with an analytical modeling approach to screening basin-scale, long-term soil moisture variability and change in a changing climate. This coupling enables assessment of both spatial differences and temporal changes across a wide range of hydro-climatic conditions. Model application is exemplified for two major Swedish hydrological basins, Norrström and Piteälven. These are located along a steep temperature gradient and have experienced different hydro-climatic changes over the time period of study, 1950-2009. Spatially, average intra-annual variability of soil moisture differs considerably between the basins due to their temperature-related differences in snow dynamics. With regard to temporal change, the long-term average state and intra-annual variability of soil moisture have not changed much, while inter-annual variability has changed considerably in response to hydro-climatic changes experienced so far in each basin.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Geography and Quaternary Geology, Stockholm University, 106 91, Stockholm, Sweden, lucile.verrot@natgeo.su.se.
authors.forename: Lucile
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Verrot
authors.forename: Georgia
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Destouni
mesh_terms: D002980:Climate; D057231:Climate Change; D017753:Ecosystem; D012914:Snow; D012987:Soil
chemical_list: D012987:Soil