CORRELATOR: a Software to Store and Correlate Soil Resource Information CORRELATOR: a Software to Store and Correlate Soil Resource Information Edoardo A.C. Costantini, Ferdinando Urbano, Roberto Barbetti - Istituto Sperimentale per lo Studio e la Difesa del Suolo, Firenze, Italy, 2003 ASA-CSSA-SSSA Annual Meetings, Denver, Colorado, November 2-6. Session: Soil Resources, Characterization, and Databases TYPOLOGICAL UNIT CODE SUBUNIT CODE FUNCTIONAL HORIZON CODE … ATTRIBUTES … ∞ ∞ HORIZON SURVEY CODE OBSERVATION TYPE OBSERVATION NUMBER HORIZON NUMBER … ATTRIBUTES … ROUTINARY ANALYSIS SURVEY CODE OBSERVATION TYPE OBSERVATION NUMBER HORIZON NUMBER ROUTIN. ANALYSIS NUMBER … ATTRIBUTES … EXTRA ANALYSIS SURVEY CODE OBSERVATION TYPE OBSERVATION NUMBER HORIZON NUMBER EXTRA ANALYSIS NUMBER … ATTRIBUTES … SITE SURVEY CODE OBSERVATION TYPE OBSERVATION NUMBER … TYPOLOGICAL UNIT CODE … ATTRIBUTES … TYPOLOGICAL UNITS TYPOLOGICAL UNIT CODE … ATTRIBUTES … TYPOLOGICAL SUBUNIT TYPOLOGICAL UNIT CODE SUBUNIT CODE … ATTRIBUTES … FUNCTIONAL HORIZON ∞ ∞ 1 ∞ SCHEMATIC DATABASE STRUCTURE (1) CORRELATOR-Management of soil data: Soil form_site qualities CORRELATOR has been developed using the MSAccess database. It offers all the main functions to create and manage a soil observation database. The software has a complete set of form for storing and viewing soil observation data. In the soil form mask, the field “functional qualities to be used in the correlation” explicates the most important characters of the soil. (2) CORRELATOR-Management of soil data: Horizons_data 1 CORRELATOR masks offer multiple choice menus and a coding system to support data entry. The attributes describe all the most important information for both site characteristics and qualities and soil description and analysis. In the horizon mask, the field “functional hor.” qualifies the horizon as a functional horizon, to be grouped with others of similar functional characteristics. (4) CORRELATOR–Definition of Typological Units: characters 1 (3) CORRELATOR–Print output: Soil description CORRELATOR can generate special reports for a paper format output. Reports summarize all the relevant information in a prosaic description. Reports available are: soil profile, typological units and typological subunits. Typological units mask describes the environment of the typologies and their modal profile. It is linked to the soil descriptions by the attribute “CODE STU”. Each typological unit has the list of all the subunit belonging to it. (5) CORRELATOR–Definition of Subunits: functional horizons The subunit mask allows to describe the main characteristics of the subunits belonging to the same typological unit. Horizons are grouped in functional horizons. CORRELATOR calculates functional horizon statistics of the most important parameters. The standard deviation of these parameters indicates how many profiles of the subunit are consistent. Introduction Soil profile information is usually correlated, by means of both expert judgment and national or international soil classifications, to create soil typological units (STU) and subunits (STS). In case of trans-national or trans-regional soil mapping, this activity becomes difficult, if different classification systems are used and expert judgment has not been recorded and it is no more available. CORRELATOR is a software conceived to store soil information and facilitate its correlation regionally and among different soil classification systems. Materials and Methods The application uses the MSAccess database manager software. It has been produced taking into account Soil Taxonomy and WRB soil classifications, the USDA NRCS field book for describing and sampling soils, and the manual of procedures of the georeferenced soil database of Europe. It also contains the original attributes proposed by the project “Soil map of Italy at 1:250,000 scale” and the formalization of the criteria used in the expert judgment. What CORRELATOR can do In addition to guide data entry and store data, CORRELATOR calculates basic statistics of: i) soil characteristics of the functional horizon, ii) soil qualities of the site. CORRELATOR has a series of facilities: it allows to visualize how many data are used to calculate the statistics, how many observations each STU and STS has, what are the functional horizons of a STS. CORRELATOR can provide a printout of profile description and analysis, as well as of STU and STS. The correlation process The correlation needs that every soil horizon is coded as “functional horizon”. A functional horizon can be a genetic horizon, or a part of it, and it ought to have a management importance, e.g. an Ap1 horizon is different from an Ap2 if its organic matter content is significantly higher. Every soil quality that are deemed characteristics of the profile must be stored and the choice of those which are deemed important, i.e. functional, for the correlation must be made explicit. Functional characteristics and qualities are those that are both relevant for the management and geographically recurrent. STS are thought to be the basic brick of the land evaluation. They are created grouping soils homogeneous in terms of i) environment (geology, morphology and land use), ii) main genetic processes, properties and materials, iii) soil management and conservation, and iv) functional qualities. Basic statistics of properties and qualities of sites and functional horizons are automatically calculated for each STS. The standard deviation of properties and qualities that have been chosen for the correlation must be rather low, while it can be high for the others. A STU groups STS at a more generalized level, usually for a more geographically wider soil characterization. STU can also be created when few profiles are available, as soon as a link between soil profiles and a landscape has been discovered. CORRELATOR’s availability CORRELATOR has an Italian and an English version and it is freely distributed by the Italian National Centre of Soil Cartography on request to References Soil Survey Staff Soil taxonomy: A basic system of soil classification for making and interpreting soil surveys. 2nd ed. USDA-NRCS Agric. Handb U.S. Gov. Print. Office, Washington, DC. Finke, P., R. Hartwich, R. Dudal, J. Ibanez, M. Jamagne, D. King, L. Montanarella, and N. Yassoglu Georeferenced soil database for Europe. EUR 18092, Ispra, Italy. Wolf U., Carnicelli St., Ferrari G.A Guida di rilevamento in campagna. (6) CORRELATOR Print output: Typological unit The typological unit report is automatically generated by CORRELATOR. It shows all the characteristics of the unit, its modal soil and the soil conservation and management problems. A brief description of all the subunits is given, too. (3) CORRELATOR–Print output: Subunit description and statistics The subunit report visualizes all the information linked to the subunit. It is made up of two parts: a general description of the subunit and a statistical report. For all the main site and horizon parameters (slope, rock depth, texture, bulk density, …), CORRELATOR computes mean and standard variation of all the soil observations belonging to the subunit. Horizons are grouped according to their functional horizon code. These statistics can be update anytime. They are a very strong instrument to verify the real correlation of the observations. The standard deviation is a direct measure of the consistency of the subunit: according to it, soil observation can be added to the sub unit or deleted.