Abstract
To investigate the dependence of surface soil moisture and evaporation on topography, a 19-site network of observations was carried out in a small watershed near Tiksi, Eastern Siberia, during July 1999. A topographic index of relative elevation, the difference between the elevations of the observation sites and the stream (DZ), was the dominant factor affecting the spatial distribution of surface soil moisture and evaporation. Both surface soil volumetric water content and evaporation decreased as DZ increased, the former exponentially and the latter logarithmically. A significant difference was evident between adjacent regions to the east and west of the stream, even though DZ was the same.
