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
Elena Mikhailova, Christopher Post, Mark Schlautman, John Galbraith, Hamdi Zurqani(9-2019)

Lithospheric-derived resources such as soil texture and coarse fragments are key soil physical properties that contribute to ecosystem services (ES), which can be valued based on "soil" or "mineral" stocks. Soil survey data provides an inexpensive alternative to detailed field measurements which are often labor-intensive, time-consuming, and costly to obtain. However, both field and soil survey data contain heterogeneous information with a certain level of variability and uncertainty in data. This study compares the potential of using field measurements and information from the Soil Survey Geographic database (SSURGO) for coarse fragments (CF), sand (S), silt (Si), clay (C), and texture class (TC) in the surface soil (Ap horizon) for the 147-hectare Cornell University Willsboro Research Farm, NY. Maps were created based on following methods: (a) utilizing data from the SSURGO database for individual soil map unit (SMU) at the field site and using representative or reported values across individual SMU; (b) averaging the field data within a specific SMU boundary and using the averaged value across the SMU; and (c) interpolating field data within the farm boundaries based on the individual soil cores. This study demonstrates the important distinction between mapping using the "crisp" boundaries of SSURGO databases compared to the actual spatial heterogeneity of field interpolated data. Maps of CF, S, Si, C, and TC values derived from interpolated field core samples were dissimilar to maps derived by using averaged core results or SSURGO values over the SMUs. Dissimilarities in the maps of CF, S, Si, C, and TC can be attributed to several factors (e.g., official soil series data being collected from "type locations" outside of the study areas). Correlation plot of clay estimates for each SMU showed statistically significant correlations between SSURGO and field-averaged (r = 0.823, p = 0.003) and field-interpolated clay (r = 0.584, p = 0.028) estimates, but no correlation was found for CF, S, and Si. Ecosystem services provided by quantitative data such as CF, S, Si, and C may not be independent from each other and other soil properties. Key soil properties should also include categorical data, such as texture class, which is used for another key soil property-available soil water ratings. Current valuation of soil texture is often linked to specific mineral commodities, which does not always address the issue of soil based valuation including indirect use value. arabic 19 English 133
Elena Mikhailova, Christopher Post, Patrick Gerard, Mark Schlautman, Michael Cope, Garth Groshans, Roxanne Stiglitz, Hamdi Zurqani, John Galbraith(9-2019)

أجريت الدراسة لتقييم مختلف عمليات مقاومة الانجراف المائي، بمنطقة تارسين الملاصقة لمنطقة العربان من الناحية الجنوبية، و الواقعة جنوب شرق منطقة غريان، والتى تتضمنت اقامة المدرجات التعويقية الحجرية بالمجارى المائية الصغيرة وبسفوح الوديان، وإقامة المدرجات الترابية ببعض المواقع القابلة للزراعة والمتأثرة بالانجراف. بينت النتائج ايجابيات عمليات مقاومة الإنجراف المائي وحفظ التربة والمياه. إن تلك الانشاءات قد تعرضت للترسيب عبر السنين،الأمر الذي يتطلب تنظيف المدرجات بمعدل (129.88- 519.4) سنة، من أقل إلى أعلى ارتفاع لتلك المدرجات (50-200) سم، بعدد مرات تنظيف (16.4-4.16) منذ بداية اقامة المدرجات حتى عام 2020م، وأن التربة قد تتعرض للانجراف بصورة أسوأ إذا لم يتم الاهتمام بالمدرجات الحاجزة لمياه الأمطار. أظهرت الدراسة أيضاً أن تربة المنطقة تتعرض للتعرية الريحية بإزالة الغطاء النباتي الطبيعي عن طريق الرعي الجائر والاحتطاب، وعدم تعويضه بنباتات أخرى ملائمة للبيئة، الأمر الذي يوثر سلبياً على التوازن البيئي بين مكونات البيئة في منطقة الدراسة. arabic 126 English 0
يوسف محمد الغزيلي, المنتصر بالله مختارمحمد القريقني, د. أحمد إبراهيم خماج(3-2021)