Description: This data set is a digital soil survey and generally is the most
detailed level of soil geographic data developed by the National
Cooperative Soil Survey. The information was prepared by digitizing
maps, by compiling information onto a planimetric correct base
and digitizing, or by revising digitized maps using remotely
sensed and other information.
This data set consists of georeferenced digital map data and
computerized attribute data. The map data are in a soil survey area
extent format and include a detailed, field verified inventory
of soils and miscellaneous areas that normally occur in a repeatable
pattern on the landscape and that can be cartographically shown at
the scale mapped. A special soil features layer (point and line
features) is optional. This layer displays the location of features
too small to delineate at the mapping scale, but they are large
enough and contrasting enough to significantly influence use and
management. The soil map units are linked to attributes in the
National Soil Information System relational database, which gives
the proportionate extent of the component soils and their properties.
Purpose:
SSURGO depicts information about the kinds and distribution of
soils on the landscape. The soil map and data used in the SSURGO
product were prepared by soil scientists as part of the National
Cooperative Soil Survey.
Supplemental_Information:
Digital versions of hydrography, cultural features, and other
associated layers that are not part of the SSURGO data set may be
available from the primary organization listed in the Point of
Contact.
Description: This displays the representative texture class and modifier of the surface horizon.
Texture is given in the standard terms used by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. These terms are defined according to percentages of sand, silt, and clay in the fraction of the soil that is less than 2 millimeters in diameter. "Loam," for example, is soil that is 7 to 27 percent clay, 28 to 50 percent silt, and less than 52 percent sand. If the content of particles coarser than sand is 15 percent or more, an appropriate modifier is added, for example, "gravelly."
Description: Northern Quahog or Hard Clam (Mercenaria mercenaria) Habitat Suitability — A Subaqueous Soil Interpretation
The Northern quahog (Mercenaria mercenaria), commonly called the hard clam, is a species of great ecological, economic, and cultural importance. Hard clams are found in intertidal and subtidal areas from Nova Scotia, Canada to Florida. A similar species, the Southern quahog (Mercenaria campechiensis), lives in coastal waters from North Carolina south to Florida and Texas. Throughout their ranges, these hard clam species support extensive commercial aquaculture farming and recreational harvest activities.
Hard clams have thick shells, a violet interior border, and short siphons. The violet-colored part of the shell was fashioned into wampum by Native Americans for use as money or jewelry, hence the Latin name Mercenaria. Hard clams are the most commonly cultured of the bivalve species. Clams are an infaunal species (living in the sediment or soil). It uses a strong muscular foot to burrow into sediment (soil) and then extends siphons to the sediment-water interface allowing it to filter feed phytoplankton from the water.
Purpose: Hard clams serve as biological indicators of changing environmental conditions because adult clams are sedentary. Hard clams do not migrate, so any disturbance may cause long-term population effects. While conservation and protection of existing hard clam habitat is the best strategy for addressing this problem, restoring areas that supported hard clams in the past is a valuable management measure.
This soil interpretation is intended to help identify sites with appropriate soil (substrate) types for targeted hard clam habitat restoration.
Soil Rating Classes:
High Suitability: Soils in this rating class have a high potential for establishing successful hard clam habitat because they have the best soil properties or characteristics.
Moderate Suitability: Soils in this rating class have a moderate potential for successful hard clam habitat establishment due to one limiting soil property or characteristic such as soil texture or electrical conductivity.
Low Suitability: Soils in this rating class have a low potential for successful hard clam habitat establishment due to multiple limiting soil properties or characteristics.
Not Suitable: Soils in this rating class are not suitable for oyster restoration because they are freshwater subaqueous soils that lack the appropriate salinity levels necessary for hard clams.
Not Rated: These soils or miscellaneous areas are not subaqueous soils; therefore, they are not rated as this soil interpretation should only take into consideration subaqueous and submerged soils.
Description: Eastern Oyster (Crassostrea virginica) Habitat Restoration Suitability — A Subaqueous Soil Interpretation
The Eastern oyster (Crassostrea virginica) is native to the eastern seaboard from the Gulf of St. Lawrence in Canada, south to the Gulf of Mexico coast of North America. Often concentrated on oyster bars, beds, or rocks, which are located in waterways with firm bottom areas, oysters attach to one another forming dense reefs that provide habitat for many fish and invertebrates.
Like all oysters, the Eastern oyster is a filter feeder. They draw in water and filter out plankton and detritus to digest, then discharge unwanted food items and particulate matter, thus cleaning the water around them. One oyster can filter more than 50 gallons of water in 24 hours. Oyster beds have an estimated 50 times the surface area of an equally sized flat bottom and attract a high concentration of larger predators looking for food (Eastern Oyster, 2016).
Oysters are considered a keystone species in most estuaries along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts. Grabowski and Peterson (2007) recognized seven ecosystem services provided by Crassostrea virginica habitats. They are: (1) oyster production; (2) water filtration and concentration of pseudofeces; (3) provision of habitat for epibenthic invertebrates; (4) nutrient sequestration; (5) augmented fish production; (6) stabilization of adjacent habitats and shoreline; and (7) diversification of the landscape and ecosystem.
Despite their significance, oyster reefs are one of the most threatened marine habitats on earth. In the last decade, many people have come to support oyster restoration efforts for the purposes of conservation and provision of ecosystem services. Construction of oyster reefs is supported as an avenue for protecting biodiversity, regulating nutrients in estuaries through water filtration, protecting shorelines from erosion, and providing habitat for many estuarine species.
This soil interpretation is intended to help identify sites with appropriate soil (substrate) types for targeted oyster habitat restoration.
Soil Rating Classes:
High Suitability: Soils in this rating class have a high potential for successful oyster restoration because they have the best soil properties or characteristics for a successful establishment of an oyster reef.
Moderate Suitability: Soils in this rating class have a moderate potential for successful oyster restoration due to one or more limiting soil properties or characteristics such as soil texture or electrical conductivity.
Low Suitability: Soils in this rating class have a low potential for successful oyster restoration due to multiple limiting soil properties or characteristics.
Not Suitable: Soils in this rating class are not suitable for oyster restoration because they are freshwater subaqueous soils that lack the appropriate salinity levels necessary to establish and grow oysters.
Not Rated: These soils or miscellaneous areas are not subaqueous soils; therefore, they are not rated as this soil interpretation should only take into consideration subaqueous and submerged soils.
References
Eastern Oyster. http://www.ereferencedesk.com/resources/state-gemstone/louisiana-gemstone.html (accessed May 2016).
Grabowski, J.H., and C.H. Peterson. 2007. Restoring oyster reefs to recover ecosystem services. In: Cuddington, K., J.E. Byers, W.G. Wilson, and A. Hastings (editors). Ecosystem Engineers: concepts, theory and applications. Elsevier- Academic Press, Amsterdam. p. 281-298.
Description: Parent material name is a term for the general physical, chemical, and mineralogical composition of the unconsolidated material, mineral or organic, in which the soil forms. Mode of deposition and/or weathering may be implied by the name.
The soil surveyor uses parent material to develop a model used for soil mapping. Soil scientists and specialists in other disciplines use parent material to help interpret soil boundaries and project performance of the material below the soil. Many soil properties relate to parent material. Among these properties are proportions of sand, silt, and clay; chemical content; bulk density; structure; and the kinds and amounts of rock fragments. These properties affect interpretations and may be criteria used to separate soil series. Soil properties and landscape information may imply the kind of parent material.
For each soil in the database, one or more parent materials may be identified. One is marked as the representative or most commonly occurring. The representative parent material name is presented here.
Unique Value Renderer: Field 1: ParMatNm Field 2: null Field 3: null Field Delimiter: ; Default Symbol:
N/A
Default Label: null UniqueValueInfos:
Value: coarse-loamy marine deposits over herbaceous organic material Label: coarse-loamy marine deposits over herbaceous organic material Description: Symbol:
Value: loamy estuarine deposits over sandy and loamy drift or sandy estuarine deposits Label: loamy estuarine deposits over sandy and loamy drift or sandy estuarine deposits Description: Symbol: