The Soils of Elgin County - Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada

Capability ratings for the soils and land unitsidentified in the symbols shown on the soil mapsare given in Table 4 . The following examples oftypical map symbols' will demonstrate theprocedures that should be followed when usingTable 4 to determine the appropriate soilcapability rating or ratings for symbols shown onthe soil maps .Example 1. BV .LCIn this example, 80% or more of the arearepresented by the symbol consists of Beverlyloamy phase (BV.L) soils which occur on simple Cslopes of 2 to 5%.Procedure:1) Locate the symbol'BV.L" in the first column ofTable 4 titled "Map Symbol" .2) Determine the appropriate slope class columnby locating the slope class "C" which appearsunder the heading tided "Capabilityclassification by slope classes".3) Now move horizontally across the line forBV.L soils to the C slope class column, wherethe capability rating is given. The soilcapability rating for BV .L soils which occur onC slopes is 2DE.Example 2BV.LC>bIn this example, 40% to 80% of the arearepresented by the symbol consists of Beverlyloamy phase (BV.L) soils which occur on simple Cslopes of 2 to 5% (dominant slope), and 20% toless than 40% of the area consists of Beverly loamyphase (BV.L) soils which occur on complex bslopes of 0.5 to 2% (significant slope) . Twocapability ratings must therefore be determined.Procedure:1) Locate the symbol'BV.L" in the first column ofTable 4 titled "Map Symbol".2) Determine the appropriate slope class columnsby locating slope class "C" and slope class "b"which appear under the heading tided"Capability classification by slope classes".3) Nowmove horizontally across the BV .L line tothe C slope class column, where the capabilityrating of 2DE is shown . This is the rating forBV.L soils which occur on C slopes. On thesame line, now move to the b slope classcolumn where the capability rating of 2D isshown. This is the rating forBV .L soils whichoccur on b slopes.4) The soil capability rating for the map symbolis 2DE>2D .Example 3.BV>TO.CbIn this example, 40% -to 80% of the areaprepresented by the symbol consists of Beverly(BV) soils which occur on complex b slopes of 0.5to 2%, and 20% to less than 40% of the areaconsists ofToledo coarse phase (TO.C) soils whichalso occur on complex b slopes .Procedure:1) Locate the symbols "BV" and 'TO.C' in thefirst column of Table 4 titled "Map Symbol".2) Determine the appropriate slope class columnby locating slope class "b" which appearsunder the heading titled "Capabilityclassification by slope classes" .3) Now go to the BV line and move horizontallyacross the line to the b slope class column,where the capability rating of 2D is shown .This is the rating for BV soils which occur onb slopes .4) Now go to the TO.C line and movehorizontally across the line to theb slope classcolumn . The capability rating of 3W is shownin the b slope class column, which is theappropriate rating if tile drainage is feasible orin place. If tile drainage is not feasible for theTO.C soils, the capability rating is 5W, whichis the rating shown in brackets . In Table 4,where tile drainage is not feasible for poorlyand very poorly drained soils, the non-drainedcapability rating is given in brackets .5) The soil capability rating for the map symbol,therefore, is 2D>3W if tile drainage is feasibleor in place for the TO.C soils. However, if tiledrainage is not feasible for the TO.C soils, thecapability rating would then be 2D>5W.Example 4.BV>TAb>cIn this example, 40% to 80% of the arearepresented by the symbol consists of Beverly (BV)soils which occur on complex b slopes of 0.5 to 2%(dominant slope), and 20% to less than 40% of thearea consists of Tavistock soils (TA) which occuron complex c slopes of 2 to 5% (significant slope) .57