about weather data format

[minfeng tang]

Hello APEX/EPIC group,

I am at the stage of understanding weather data setup and format for WinAPEX. I am reading the manual "Creating a WinEPIC/CropMan/WinAPEX Database and Related Files for Your Area Using the Texas Central Database". On page  7 of this manual, Figure shows an example of excel weather file format (pic attached). However, this data format was not found in the TEXAS CENTRAL database access by Microsoft Access (pic attached). I wonder what makes the difference between the data format in these two examples. I also wanted to try to use Weather Import (link:http://epicapex.tamu.edu/downloads/model-executables/weather-import/). For some unknow reason, it was not successful. Please help. Thank you!

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[Luca]

Dear Minfeng,

The weather data reported in the two examples here are of two different types. The data reported in the Excel weather file is in the form of daily data. This information is not stored in the Access database but in text files with extension DLY located in the same folder where the APEX executable is located.

The figure with the data in Access shows the monthly weather data so, it is not possible to make any comparison between them.

So, I think that what you can do next depends on what you need to do. DO you need to create a daily weather file or do you need to create a monthly weather file?

What was the problem with weather import? Were you able to download and install it? Did you have problems running it? Please, provide us more information.

Thanks,

Luca

[minfeng tang]

Dear Luca, 

I think I have figured it out. My understanding is that I can obtain daily weather data from local weather stations based on my previous experience. These daily data can then be formulated as monthly data format as required to be fed into the WinAPEX, which is the form I see from the Central  Texas database. I have successfully installed Weather Import. Those are my understanding, please let me know if somewhere I got misunderstood. Thank you, Luca.  

I probably need to post the following questions in another post. As I am using WinAPEX to analyze rangeland management in Kansas, is there any way to obtain a database for Kansas like the one of Central Texas saved in the WinAPEX? I will need six other states as well, so I am not sure how to obtain that database for each state, i.e., MT, ND, SD, NE,WY, and OK. Thank you, Luca. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[Luca]

Dear Minfeng,

You got it right. You can use daily weather data collected from several sources to create your daily weather file (DLY). This can be done using Excel to create a space-delimited text file that will be used in Weather import to create the actual DLY file. The second step would be to use Weather Import to read the DLY file you have created to calculate the monthly statistics required to create the WP1 file. If I  remember correctly, Weather Import will add this information directly to the Access database used for your project.

Please, send me a list of the states you are interested in and I can provide you the corresponding databases and weather files.

Best,

Luca

[minfeng tang]

Dear Luca, 

Great. I am glad to know that I have found the right direction to format weather data. The project I am working on covers seven states. They are Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming, Kansas, and Oklahoma States. I want to start with Kansas State database. Thank you so much, Luca. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[Luca]

Dear Minfeng,

I have the databases you need but I would like to make sure (as much as we can) that they are going to work with the version of APEX you are using. To do this, I would like to check with you two things. The first one is in the .OUT output file. When you open it, on or around 20 you should see the APEX1501 version and the date and time of the simulation. After APEX1501, is there a version number (as a date format like vYYYYMMDD) before the date of the simulation?

The second thing I would like to check with you is in the Centra Texas database that comes with the installer. If you open it, open the control table (the table named Control Table APEX) and go towards the far right of the table, can you find variables named BUS1, BUS2, BUS3, and BUS4, or do you see something like CPV0, CPH0, DZDN, and DTG?

Please, let me know and we can continue to work together to provide you the databases you need.

Also, there might be the possibility I can share with you an updated version of the WinAPEX interface. Let me know if you are interested in giving it a try. It will come with one database that covers the entire US.

Best,

Luca

[minfeng tang]

Dear Luca,

Thank you so much for your response. I opened the .OUT output file (the file name was SITE2.OUT). I saw some information on row 20: APEX1501 2021 5  4  10:21:23. I checked Control Table APEX from Central Texas database and found variables named BUS1, BUS2, BUS3, and BUS4. Please let me know if these are the information you would like to know. 

I definitely would like to try the updated version of WinAPEX interface. How ad when will it be available for downloading? Thank you!

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[Luca]

Dear Minfeng,

Yes, those are the information I need to provide the databases you need in the format you need (or reducing the margin of error...).

About the new version, I will discuss it with a colleague to see what he thinks and I will let you know soon.

Best,

Luca

[minfeng tang]

Thank you, Luca! I look forward to hearing from you soon. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[minfeng tang]

Dear Luca, 

I will go with the version that would be available sooner. If you have questions or need additional information regarding the database for the seven states, please let me know. Thank you. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[Luca]

Dear MInfeng,

You will receive an email from the Filex system we use to share files that could be blocked if sent by email. The email will have a link to download the installer for the latest version of WinAPEX and a pdf with the user's manual of this updated interface. I don't remember if I have already mentioned this to you but, this version comes with a single database (SQLite instead of Access) with information for all the States in the US.

Give it a try and let me know if you run into any issues.

Best,

Luca

[Javier Fernando Mendez Monroy]

Dear Luca.

Is it possible to get the version of the latest WinApex? I am also interested in the SQLite database.

Thank you so much.

[minfeng tang]

Dear Luca, 

Thank for sending me the package of WinAPEX1015. It took me some time to read through the manual and set it up on my desktop. I will keep you updated. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[minfeng tang]

  Dear Luca, 

I have a question about soil data. I use Web soil survey (link:https://websoilsurvey.sc.egov.usda.gov/App/HomePage.htm) as my soil data source. Using Soil data viewer, I have found some of the soil attributes values that are required for APEX model but I didn't find some of these: soil layer number, soil albedo, depth from soil surface to bottom of soil layer, and organic carbon concentration. These soil data are all from the U.S.

Do you have any good data source or suggestions that I can find these data? I apologize that I feel this question is not directly related to the APEX model. Thank you. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[Luca]

Minfeng,

I know that several people use the data from Soil Survey Geographic Database (SSURGO) but I never used it myself. You can find the website at the following link and you can explore the site to download the information (https://data.nal.usda.gov/dataset/soil-survey-geographic-database-ssurgo). See what you can find and let me know if you need more information.

Best,

Luca

[minfeng tang]

Thanks, Luca! I have figured out how to find and define these soil properties. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[minfeng tang]

Dear Luca, 

When I was running the new version of WinAPEX 1015, I got an error message box. This error message occurred twice in the past two weeks. Do you have any idea  why it happened and how to handle with it? Thanks. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[Luca]

Dear Minfeng,

I have never seen this error before, but I can tell that it is generated by the interface and not by the APEX model itself. It seems that there is a problem connecting to the database, but I cannot say anything more. I will try to do some investigation and I will let you know as soon as possible.

Please, remind me about this topic if you do not get an answer in the next week.

Best,

Luca

[minfeng tang]

Hello Luca, 

There is another error message box that is consistently displaying whenever a user has selected the cell of "Run name", i.e. Run 1, even if nothing has been edited about this cell. Screen shot is attached. I kind of feel that might be a common issue that might have been experienced by every user because I essentially just re-installed this the WinAPEX and haven't done anything about it. Thanks. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[Luca]

I noticed this problem before. Even if you have not change the run, try renaming the run using only uppercase letters (so, from Run1 to RUN1). I think that something in the system (possibly Windows?) rename automatically.

Let me know if it works.

Luca

[minfeng tang]

Hello Luca,

Again, I got the message saying that "Unhandled exception has occurred in your application...". Before this message popped up, I clicked "Build Data Set", and then click "Yes" on a following popped-up box asking "Do you want to overwrite the run file?" It stopped me from running the simulation and I could only exit the model. I guess that might be related to the process of building files needed for simulation. I will explain what I did starting from the Utilities, and please let me know if there is any step that is missing or not correct. 

1)Starting with utilities:

The Utilities consists of 11 items. Some need to be copied/created and then edited on the new file, and some just editing on the selections directly. Here is what I did to each items of Utilities:

Control file: I created a new control file before editing. I created a new name "SAMPLE1",  and edited and saved it.

Equipment/Activity: I selected the items that are required for project, say grazing, and edited and saved. 

                                    (Here is my confusion, what to do with the other equipment/activities? Will they be recognized and incorporated into my project if I just leave them there? Do I need to                                          delete the other irrelevant equipment/activity?)

Fertilizer: similar to Equipment/activity, do I need to delete the other items that are not related to my project to avoid those items to be incorporated into my project?

Management: After selecting the specific country and region, I chose and edited some items and saved the management file. Do I need to delete the other irrelevant management items?

Owner: I created a new owner file, named it SAMPLE1, and then edited the cells in SAMPLE1 and then saved it. 

Pesticide and Plant data: similar to Equipment/Activity, Fertilizer, and Management, do I need to delete all the other irrelevant items?

Soils: Select the country, region, and sub-region. Copied and edited the selected soil types/items. Do I need to delete all other irrelevant items?

Watershed: create a new name for watershed, select the country, add selected weather station and associated information, and saved it. The name of the watershed is "SAMPLE1". 

Weather: similar to soil, select the country, region, and local weather station, edit the copied weather file and its associated default weather data, and saved it. 

2) after all these have done, I went to the home page and open the new project "SAMPLE1", and clicked "Build the data set", and returned these two box messages (attached). 

I looked the RUN file and compared the file with the one that of the default project, and the number of DAT files are far less than the latter. I guess I might have missed some steps. Please help. Thanks. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[Luca]

Dear Minfeng,

There is no need to delete the fertilizers, pesticides, management, soils, etc. that you are not using in your project. Those are stored in the database and will be available for future projects.

After you created the watershed, have you created the subarea? I think this is the step you are missing. I followed your steps and I had the same error, while everything worked fine when I created the subarea.

Best,

Luca

[minfeng tang]

Hello Luca, 

After creating two subareas, it still give the error message. The good news is that there are more files in the RUN folder than last time. I made a comparison with that of the default SAMPLE. It lacked the following files: BARLEY-DRYLAND-NO-TILL-(SOUTH).OPC, BELTON-DAM.WP1, TEMPLE.WND, and WinAPEX.SUB. The lack of the last file seems to indicate that the creation of subareas was not successful? Please help. Thank you. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng

[Luca]

Minfeng,

It can be that something is wrong in the subareas you have created. I think I shared with you the user manual, didn't I?

Try to edit your project creating only one subarea and see if everything works. Then, edit the watershed removing the single subarea and creating two subareas as you need.

Luca

[minfeng tang]

Hi Luca, 

I created one and two subareas independently. Unfortunately, it did not work. Do you have any other idea? 

Thanks,

Minfeng

[minfeng tang]

It would be great if we could have a virtual talk and take a look at my files together. Please let me know if you are available. Thanks. 

Sincerely,

Minfeng