This is a four- parameter function to determine water retention hydraulic parameters contained in the Gardner water retention model
Usage
SSgardner(x, thr, ths, alp, nscal)
Value
A list of objects returned by standard R regression functions such as nls and lm
Arguments
x
Suction potential/head as contained in the x-column of the xy water retention table or data
thr
This is the residual moisture content. It's the moisture content when suction potential is very high (almost at the drying point)
ths
This is the saturated moisture content. It's the moisture content when suction potential is very low (almost at the saturation point)
alp
It's the inverse of air-entry potential or bubbling pressure
nscal
This is a parameter or index for the pore-size distribution
Author
Christian Thine Omuto
Details
A Gardner model is a type of nonlinear curve fitting model for fitting water retention characteristics using experimental data. It requires initial parameter estimates for the model to work. This can be obtained using Dstart function (e.g. thr=Dstart(data)[1]). If warnings are given during the estimation process, try to increase the iteration limit using control function. Sometimes the warnings can be suppressed using (warn=-1)/ignored since they do not terminate the process
References
Gardner WR. 1958. Some steady state solutions of the unsaturated moisture flow equation with application to evaporation from a water table. Soil Science 85: 228-232