Together, moss and lichen dominate understory cover beneath boreal forest canopies, yet neither are well understood in a hydrological sense. The unique interception, nonvascular uptake, and storage of precipitation by these understory canopies impact the overarching hydrological cycle in these forests. However, these processes are seldom explicitly represented in hydrological modelling. This work investigates the processes of rainfall interception and evaporation in a southern jack pine forest in central Saskatchewan. Lab measurements are first used to determine the water holding characteristics of moss and lichen samples. These are then supplemented by a field study involving electrical resistance measurements of vegetation moisture content and above- and below-canopy eddy covariance measurements to quantify the contribution of lichens and mosses to overall forest evapotranspiration. Through these measurements it was possible to directly measure the water balance components of the understory vegetation. This research aims to improve the understanding of moss and lichen systems and to better represent these important species in hydrological and land-surface models.