## 3 Materials  
Data have been collected between April and August 2006 in the framework of the AgriSAR 2006 project (funded by the European Space Agency, ESA) primarily planned to address programmatic needs of Sentinel-1 two-satellite constellation. AgriSAR 2006 campaign was specifically tailored to investigate \(\sigma^{\circ}\) dynamic throughout the crop-growing season. The dataset includes weekly in situ measures and airborne SAR and optical images. \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c} \hline \hline
**Crop (ID)** & **Sowing Dates** & **Harvest Dates** \\ \hline Wheat (230, 250) & 5 September–31 October & 15–31 August \\ Barley (440, 450) & 12–25 September & 15–25 July \\ Rape (101, 140) & 8 August–5 September & 28 July–10 August \\ Maize (222) & 20 April–5 May & 25 September–10 October \\ Sugar beet (102, 460) & 25 March–20 April & 25 September–31 October \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table} 
Table 2: Sowing and harvesting dates for main crops during the investigation period; plots IDs are reported within brackets. Figure 1: L\({}_{\text{HV}}\) diachronic composition of the DEMMIN test-area (R: 24 May; G: 21 June; B: 26 July). Labels indicating crop IDs and cultivars are over-imposed. In particular, in situ data have been collected by the _Leibnitz-Zentrum fur Agarlandschafforschung_ (ZALF) and the University of Kiel (_Christian-Albrechts-Universitat_, Department of Geography) almost simultaneously to SAR and optical flights. Measurements of \(m_{\mathrm{v}}\) (at 0-5 and 5-10 cm below ground level, b.g.l. ), soil surface roughness, fractional cover, \(F_{\mathrm{v}}\), and _LAI_ were acquired by the research teams along 16 campaigns. In situ _LAI_ and \(m_{\mathrm{v}}\) were measured using a LICOR-2000 and a portable IMKO TRIME-FM TDR respectively, root mean square of roughness height, \(h^{\prime}\), was characterized with a laser profiler and a Rollei d7 metric digital stereoscopic system [48]. A TDR probe (IMKO TRIME-ES, theoretical accuracy of \(\pm\)0.01-\(\pm\)0.03 m\({}^{3}\)m\({}^{-3}\)) was installed from the _Ludwig-Maximilians Universitat Munchen_ (LMU) and the University of Kiel on fields 102 (sugar beet) and 250 (wheat) providing measures of \(m_{\mathrm{v}}\) at 5 depths (5, 9, 15, 25 and 47 cm b.g.l.) with a temporal resolution of half an hour. Approximately 1150 measurements were executed, equally spread among plots and acquisition times. In particular, \(\sim\)24 measurements were carried out for each in situ campaign; for each plot, always the same locations were taken into account; \(\sim\)36 measurements per plot was carried out during the whole in situ campaign for each SVV. The sugar beet field was completely bare from the first campaign in 19 April until 11 May (\(F_{\mathrm{v}}\) reached 10% in 7 June); maize field was completely bare until the end of May. Other fields were vegetated until July; rape and barley were harvested during the airborne SAR campaign (Figure 2). During the investigation three drying periods occurred; \(m_{\mathrm{v}}\) varies in the range [0.34-0.06 m\({}^{3}\)m\({}^{-3}\)] with some differences among fields. In maize crop, \(m_{\mathrm{v}}\) was higher than in other fields, probably only due to the root-zone water dynamics of this cultivar (the soil texture was similar to the other monitored plots); \(m_{\mathrm{v}}\) in barley, wheat, sugar beet and rape fields behaves similarly during the whole period. Finally, temporal trends of \(h^{\prime}\) over barley, rape and wheat fields are quite similar; whereas \(h^{\prime}\) exhibits higher values and different temporal behavior over maize and sugar beet (Figure 3). Figure 2: Temporal photo sequence of some Görmin’s fields. Pictures were collected during the investigation periods by ZALF and LMU institutes; the white gridded panel (1 m \(\times\) 1 m size, 10 cm \(\times\) 10 cm grid resolution) allows estimating the vegetation height evolution.