Australian Soil and Land Survey Field Handbook THIRD EDITION THE NATIONAL COMMITTEE ON SOIL AND TERRAIN

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1 Australian Soil and Land Survey Field Handbook THIRD EDITION THE NATIONAL COMMITTEE ON SOIL AND TERRAIN

2 CSIRO 2009 All rights reserved. Except under the conditions described in the Australian Copyright Act 1968 and subsequent amendments, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, duplicating or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. Contact CSIRO PUBLISHING for all permission requests. National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry Australian soil and land survey field handbook. 3rd ed. Collingwood, Vic. : CSIRO Publishing, (pbk.) Australian soil and land survey handbooks ; no. 1 Includes index. Bibliography. Landforms Australia Classification Handbooks, manuals, etc. Soil surveys Australia Handbooks, manuals, etc. Land use surveys Australia Handbooks, manuals, etc. Vegetation classification Australia Handbooks, manuals, etc First edition 1984; Second edition 1990 Published by CSIRO PUBLISHING 150 Oxford Street (PO Box 1139) Collingwood VIC 3066 Australia Telephone: Local call: (Australia only) Fax: publishing.sales@csiro.au Web site: Front cover image (by Linda Gregory): soil landform elements overlaid on shaded elevation. Data sources: Hook R, McPherson A, Glover M, McKenzie NJ, Aldrick J (2002) Land and soil survey, Simmons Creek Catchment, Walbundrie, NSW; and AAM Geoscan (2001) Airborne laser scanning survey of the Simmons Creek Catchment area, 10 m digital elevation model. Set in 10/13 Adobe Palatino and Adobe Sabon Edited by Alexa Cloud Cover and text design by James Kelly Typeset by Desktop Concepts Pty Ltd, Melbourne Printed in China by 1010 Printing International Ltd CSIRO PUBLISHING publishes and distributes scientific, technical and health science books, magazines and journals from Australia to a worldwide audience and conducts these activities autonomously from the research activities of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO). The views expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of, and should not be attributed to, the publisher or CSIRO.

3 CONTENTS Preface to the first edition Preface to the second edition Preface to the third edition Acknowledgements xi xiii xiv xvii Purpose and use of handbook J.G. Speight and R.F. Isbell 1 Purpose 1 Use 3 The site concept J.G. Speight and R.C. McDonald 5 Location L.J. Gregory, R.C. McDonald and R.F. Isbell 7 Method 7 State or Territory 7 Coordinates 7 Topographic map sheet 9 Global Positioning System (GPS) Survey 10 Air photo reference 10 General R.C. McDonald and R.F. Isbell 13 Described by 13 Date 13 Annual rainfall 13 Type of site 13 v

4 Australian Soil and Land Survey Field Handbook Landform J.G. Speight 15 Landform description 15 Description of landform element 17 Landform element key and glossary 31 Description of landform pattern 44 Landform pattern glossary 55 Vegetation R.J. Hnatiuk, R. Thackway and J. Walker 73 Overview of the classification 75 Recognising strata 77 Formation (Level 1) 80 Structural formation (Level 2) 88 Broad floristic formation (Level 3) and subdivisions (Levels 4 to 6) 95 Examples of standard classification 102 Wetlands 103 Rainforest 109 Growth stage 120 Condition 120 Land surface R.C. McDonald, R.F. Isbell and J.G. Speight 127 Aspect 127 Elevation 127 Drainage height 128 Disturbance of site 128 Microrelief 129 Erosion 133 Aggradation 138 Inundation 138 Coarse fragments 139 Rock outcrop 143 vi

5 Contents Depth to free water 144 Runoff 144 Soil profile R.C. McDonald and R.F. Isbell 147 Type of soil observation 147 Horizons 148 Depth of horizons 156 Depth to R horizon or strongly cemented pan 156 Colour 159 Mottles and other colour patterns 159 Field texture 161 Coarse fragments 170 Structure 171 Fabric 181 Cutans 182 Voids 184 Soil water status 186 Consistence 186 Condition of surface soil when dry 189 Water repellence 191 Pans 192 Segregations of pedogenic origin 195 Effervescence of carbonate in fine earth 198 Field ph 198 Roots 199 Boundaries between horizons 199 Soil water regime 200 Substrate J.G. Speight and R.F. Isbell 205 Properties of substrate material 206 vii

6 Australian Soil and Land Survey Field Handbook Properties of substrate masses 210 Genetic type of substrate masses 216 Glossary of substrate mass genetic types 219 Appendix 1: Soil taxonomic units R.F. Isbell and R.C. McDonald 225 The Australian Soil Classification 225 Soil Taxonomy 227 World Reference Base for soil resources (WRB) 226 References 229 Index 240 viii