How to make your simulation more specific

When not specified differently (DEFAULT) orchidee reads in a map of soil orders and a map of vegetation cover to derive the soil and vegetation specific parameter. In case you run simulations for a specific site for which observational data on vegetation and soils exist it is recommended to use this data instead.

All is done in the run.def:

# 1. you must impose a vegetation cover by
 IMPOSE_VEG = y
# here PFT=2
 SECHIBA_VEGMAX = 0,1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0

# 2. you can impose a soil order by
IMPOSE_SOILS = y
# here soil order 9
SOIL_ORDER=9

#3. you can impose the soil texture by
IMPOSE_SOILT = y
SOIL_FRACTIONS = .20 , 0.125 , 0.675
# it is stupid but you must also set these variables (same as in SOIL_FRACTIONS)
CLAY_FRACTION= 0.675
SILT_FRACTION=0.125

#others:
SOIL_PH=5.6
# bulk soil density in kg m-3
BULK=750.

WARNING

You MUST impose vegetation cover to be able to impose soil texture or soil order. Soil texture is per default read in directly and not derived from a map of soil orders. Additional parameters are derived from USDA soil order map. Therefore, you need to set texture and soil order separately.

There is clay and silt fraction as well texture which includes sand/silt/clay. This is nasty and useless, but you have to set all three variables consistently.