Soil moisture dynamics are the outcome of several interconnected processes including vegetative cover, topographic position, soil properties, and precipitation. Of these, vegetative cover is thought to play the most important role in regional and local hydrologic balance.  This is because plants vary in their physiological resistance to drought and ability to take water from deeper soil depths.  Over the past two decades, there has been growing emphasis on the potential hydrologic benefits of restoring perennial vegetation. 

The objective of this study is to build and install a network of Arduino-based soil moisture sensors in a restored prairie.  Data collected from the sensors will be ground truthed against bulk soil moisture measurements and correlated with plant cover, composition, and an integrated measure of plant water use efficiency (stable isotope d¹³C).  These data will be used to answer the following hypothesis: 1) soil moisture is positively correlated with vegetation cover; and 2) low levels of plant cover lead to high soil moisture stress but greater plant water use efficiency.