Gaining ground for farmers

By Cara Cargill & Mike GhiaNew Hampshire & Vermont Field AgentsLand For Goodcara@landforgood.orgmike@landforgood.orgwww.landforgood.org

GranitViewII Tutorial: A Resource for Farm Mapping

In our work as Field Agents for Land For Good, we work with both farmers looking for land and the non-farming property owners who are looking to make their land available for agriculture. One of the first things that farmers often ask about are the types of soils on the properties that are under discussion. In many cases, the first response we get from non-farming landowners is, “we have sent the soils out to be tested”. But soil tests answer a different question than what are the types of soils. While soil tests identify soil fertility and organic matter, they do not identify soil types, known “soil series”, as categorized by the USDA. The soil types, such as “Hadley Silt Loam” or “Windsor Loamy Fine Sand” or “Becket Fine Sandy Loam” or “Pittstown Loam” are based on characteristics influenced by the formation of soil over geologic time. The characteristics of a given soil type will influence aspects such as tillage, drainage, native fertility, and yield potential.

To figure out what soils are on the property, we start by looking at soil maps. One online tool for this purpose is the USDA Web Soil Survey - websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov/app/. While this tool is very useful, and the website has a great deal of information on soils, it tends to be slow and clunky, and is also limited to giving you only soil information.

Fortunately, a relatively new tool is available in New Hampshire, GranitViewII, which can be used to map soils as well as other features of use to farmers such as property boundaries, acreage, wetlands, elevation, flooding hazards, and much more!

To open GranitViewII go to: http://granitviewii.unh.edu/

The photo below is the home page.

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When you get to the site, the first thing that you should do is click on the box “Standard GRANIT Layers” and uncheck the box “Bing Roads” and then check the box to change the map to “Bing Hybrid”. Then click on the tab on the bottom left side labeled “Map Layers”. Your map should then look like:

In the top right hand corner of the page is the “Search” box. Enter the property address you want to research. Search results will appear on left. Choose the property that has a 100% match or the one that is closest to a

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100% match. A second box will appear to the right of search results; click on the “Zoom to Feature” link. This will zoom the map in on the property for which you searched. On the tool bar, below the “Search” box is the “Print” button. The “Print” button is used to both print maps and to also create PDF’s (or JPEG’s or PNG’s) of your maps, which you can save to your computer.

Making a number of separate maps with different layers, or features, is usually more useful than trying to show too many things on one map. Thus, as you are working, consider which layers you want to show together. For instance, you may make separate maps for soils, flood hazards, and field acreage, but include the property boundaries on the acreage map.

After zooming in the property you searched for, next click on the “Map Layers” tab to the left of the “Search Results” tab located on the bottom left side of screen.

To make a soils map, click on the “Soils” box that comes up in the list of options in the “Map Layers” tab. Clicking on the soils box will bring up the soil codes for the soil series, which refer to specific types of soil, as well as the boundaries between different soil types. Next click the “Identify” button on the middle of the tool bar located at the top of the page; this will then allow you to click on a specific soil code in an area where you are curious to learn the soil type. A box on the left will appear that explains the soil type, slope, drainage, farmland class and other important characteristics of the identified soil type in the area highlighted on the map. In order to save the soil series facts, you must highlight, copy the information, and paste in another document, such as Word. At this point the GranitViewII program is not formatted to be able to print the soil facts along with the maps you generate, the information needs to be saved and printed separately.

Next to the “Soils” box is a “+” box, when you click the “+” box it will open a menu of further options to choose from related to soils. If you click the “Farmland” box it will color code the map with USDA’s assessment of the soils for agricultural suitability. If you click on the box with 3 lines and a down arrow this will open a list that describes the significance of each color related to a given category of soil. Note there is a color transparency slider bar to the right of the “Soils” box. When you click on the bar and drag to the left, the color on the map becomes increasingly transparent. By making the color more transparent you are able to still see the image of the property underneath. This transparency slider bar is located next to every category listed in the “Map Layers” tab.

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In the “Map Layers” box another useful option is to look at “Parcels” to see the property boundaries. Click the “Parcels” button and click on the “+” sign next “Parcels”, then click on the “Parcels – polygons” box.

Clicking on the “Water Resources” box will give you information on surface waters and wetlands. To see a color coded list describing types of wetlands, click on “Water Resources”, click on the “+” sign, click on “Shoreline Buffer Zones”, click on “Wetlands” and then click on the box with three lines and the down arrow. Make sure the “Identify” button on the tool bar is highlighted and you can click on any of the colors on the map and a description of that particular highlighted color will appear in a box.

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Floodways are areas that typically flood during any type of flooding including after a spring melt. “Special Flood Hazards” include the “1-percent annual chance” (blue color), formerly known as the “100 year flood plain”. To see the floodway, click on “Floodplains (DFIRMS)”, click the “+”, click on “Flood Hazard – Areas”, click on the box with 3 bars and the down arrow. To lighten the highlighted areas, move the transparency slider bar to the left.

To calculate field acreage, click on the tab “measurement tools” on the toolbar. Then click on the big “Area” button. Under “measurement info”, you’ll want to change the “area” to “acres”. Pick your first point within

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the area you want to measure. Click, release, and move your mouse to the next corner, or bend in the field, and click again. Be careful to look for shadows from hedgerows in the picture as they often hang over the field edge. Once you finish drawing the outline double click and you’ll see the total acreage. Then press “Add as Drawing” to save highlighted field.

You’ll see in the photo below a large area highlighted in green. This is land with a conservation easement. To identify lands in conservation, click on the “Conservation Lands” box. If you click the “Identify” button and click on the area highlighted in green, a box will appear with information about the conserved land.

Spend some time exploring this highly useful resource and you will likely find other property features of interest to map. Having information on soils, flooding, water resources, and acreage will help you better understand the agricultural potential of any farmland under consideration, as well as alert you to hazards. Having maps of the land that will be available to lease or buy helps farmers and service providers evaluate the property and assess whether it will meet the needs of the farm seeker.

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