MOSES Management Fundamental Processes

Included is my summary of the current status of MOSES management processes. It is based upon George Foster's email to the MOSES management subgroup on Tue. Aug. 12, 1997 and my comments to his email message.

INTRODUCTION:

Each MOSES "operation" is defined as a list of physical "processes" representing the actual action(s) performed by the "operation". Thus, MOSES should be able to handle any operation, if all the fundamental processes required to represent the operation's actions are available within MOSES. Therefore, the definitions of all necessary fundamental physical processes required by the erosion models are listed.

Definition of a MOSES Process:

A MOSES process is defined as a process which reflects a physical change in some property or group of properties relating to the soil, surface, vegetation, residue, or any other material that impacts the ARS erosion models' representations of the soil/surface/vegetation/residue states.

MOSES Process Classifications:

Soil Surface Modification

The soil surface state is described differently within each of the erosion models. However, each model still represents the surface state condition as a unique set of variables, even though some of those variables may be influenced by other processes and properties.

Soil Mass (layer) Manipulation

The soil mass (represented as a series of stacked, parallel, homogeneous horizontal layers in some of the erosion models) is moved and changed by many management operations. The soil mass (density, aggregate size and stability, etc.) and quantity and location of soil properties (sand, silt, clay, organic matter, etc.) define the state of the soil.

Biomass Manipulation

The biomass manipulation processes describe the effects that management operations have on the growing crop and residue pools in the models. The types of processes here involve the transfer of biomass from standing to flat, live to dead, above ground to buried, buried to surface, etc.

Soil Amendments

The addition of specific materials to the soil and/or surface fall into this category. Typical processes here would include such things as the application of water (irrigation), nutrients (fertilizers), and residues.

Process Classification Issues

MOSES Processes (soil surface manipulation):

Create/Modify Random Roughness

The roughness index used will be the standard deviation of the roughness height.
RR Process Issues

Create/Modify Ridges

Ridges are fully defined within MOSES with the following information: ridge direction (row direction), ridge height, ridge spacing, ridge top width, and ridge side slope.
Ridge Process Issues

Create/Modify Dikes

Dikes exist only when ridges exist.
Dikes are fully described within MOSES with the following information: dike height, dike spacing, and dike side slope.
Dike Process Issues

Create/Modify Crust

Crust Process Issues

This document was last modified on Monday, 20-Oct-97 23:39:38 CDT.
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