Suolo - 2003 - A Field Guide to the Soil-landscapes of the Piemon

European Summer School on Soil Survey
1 The soil-landscapes of the Piemonte eastern plain
The area (Figures 1 and 2) is very representative of the Piemonte landscape features, in
particular of the complex morphologies, typical of the valleys exits, where old terraces
and actual plains cross, forming characteristic physiographic patterns.
Pedogenetic factors pose interesting problems of soil interpretation, with high spatial
variability in a relative small area.
Within few kilometres, an west-east chrono-toposequence crosses the area from the Sesia
bed to Novara ‘hills’, built on, across the geological eras, the oldest fluvioglacial deposits
as far as the most recent Sesia alluvium.
Also the soil cover reflects this variability, offering a good alternation of natural wood
landscapes, harmoniously merged into the agricultural field patterns of rice-growing and
vineyards.
These are the reasons why the Soil Staff of the Forestry and Environment Institute
(IPLAspa, Turin) has chosen this area a study window for the realisation of the Piemonte
soil map in a scale1:250,000, on the behalf of the regional administration, in the national
framework of the Italian soil map at the same scale.
A Field Guide to the Soil-landscapes of the Piemonte eastern plain 1