I have been using iButton temperature data loggers Hej ecologgers, I have been using iButton temperature data loggers as a low-cost way of determining inundation frequency in riparian zones. I'm hoping someone from ecolog will be able to give me some tips on how to process the data more efficiently.
I have two data loggers which serve as references, one is always inundated (at the bottom of the stream) and one is in the air (about 1m high, and never inundated). I then attached loggers on the ground in the riparian zone at different distances from the edge of the stream. My plan is to determine inundation frequency of the different distances from the stream by comparing the reference loggers with the loggers on the ground. In theory, when the temperature of the ground loggers match the temperature of the water within 0.5C, then that location was inundated. If the ground logger matches the air within 0.5C, then that location was not inundated. I logged temperature every 4 hours. Sounds simple enough... But, I have two years of data, 22 streams, and 5 distances from the streams. This system is dominated by a spring flood, but summer and autumn floods are common. I've started going through and graphing the data and looking at it manually, but this is really time consuming. Also, because the loggers are on the ground, they often do not match the air temperature even if they are not inundated (cold air drainage, snow cover, etc.). Because of this, I thought about comparing the fluctuation of the temperatures - since diurnal and even daily fluctuations of the water is much less variable than the air. I have no idea how to do this, or if it makes sense to do. Any thoughts or suggestions would be really helpful. Thanks from Northern Sweden, Eliza Maher Hasselquist PhD student Umeå University
