Usability of soil survey soil texture data for soil health indicator scoring

Date

2019-9

Type

Conference paper

Conference title

Communications in Soil Science and Plant Analysis

Author(s)

Elena Mikhailova
Christopher Post
Mark Schlautman
John Galbraith
Hamdi Zurqani

Abstract

Soil textural information is an important component underlying other soil health indicators. Soil texture analysis is a common procedure, but it can be labor intensive and expensive. Soil texture data typically are available from the Soil Survey Geographic (SSURGO) database, which may be an option for determining soil health texture groups (SHTG). The SSURGO database provides soil texture information in the soil map unit (SMU) name, taxonomic class category (family), and detailed values (≤ 2 mm soil fraction) of percent sand, silt and clay by soil horizon. The objective of this study was to examine the possibility of using SSURGO data for SHTG at the 147-ha Cornell University Willsboro Research Farm in New York state as an alternative for soil texture data determined manually on collected soil core samples. Comparative results revealed that representative values for soil texture from the SSURGO database generally matched measured mean values for all SMUs. arabic 11 English 65

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