Studying the Web Soil Survey of Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest

In my Biodiversity Stewardship class this week, we've been given resources to study the soil of our study area of interest. Mine, of course, is the Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest.

If y'all have never played around on the Web Soil Survey website, let me tell you, it blew my mind. I had no idea that such a powerful, FREE, resource existed to study the soil types of any given area in the United States. Take a minute to explore if you feel so inclined—I personally thought it was a lot of fun to look around in, even if a lot of the information was frankly over my head.

I started out with an approximate rectangle around the Joyce Kilmer Forest, as I'm still working on sharpening my GIS skills, which are solidly in their infancy.

My favorite tab to play around in here was the Soil Data Explorer. Within it, there's a tab labeled Suitabilities and Limitations Ratings, which maps out the suitability of uses within an Area of Interest based on a myriad of things, from military operations to wine grape production suitability. Being the hiking fiend that I am, I took most interest in the paths and trails section of this map, which you can see below.

By the way, if you're curious, like I was, this area is rated as having "very low" suitability for grape growing. So if you've ever had the wild dream to cultivate the next great American Vineyard deep in the Joyce Kilmer Forest, I'm afraid that you're out of luck.

As a beginner user of this type of resource, I now want to learn even more about the types of soils in the Joyce Kilmer Forest and how this data is applicable to professionals.

A fun tidbit of information—I did learn through perusing this site that one of the soils with the highest percentages in Graham County, NC (where Joyce Kilmer Forest is located) at 8.4% is the Cheoah-Jeffrey complex, shortened to CsF. Some information about this soil that I pulled says this:

National map unit symbol: 226cc

Landscape: Cool aspect and shaded low and intermediate mountains

Elevation: 1,660 to 4,690 feet

Mean annual precipitation: 54 to 70 inches

Mean annual air temperature: 46 to 57 degrees F

Frost-free period: 100 to 176 days

Farmland classification: Not prime farmland

One thing that stood out to me here is the 100 to 176 days without frost. That's only about 3-6 months out of the year when there isn't any frost with this type of soil. It's amazing what a little elevation can do to completely change the climate of an area. This end of Western North Carolina feels like it's far away from everything, both as the crow flies and in terms of elevation, and I mean that in the best way. It's so unique and fascinating to me.

Another thing that stood out here is the farmland classification, not prime farmland. This just gave me a chuckle, because, well, duh. If you've ever visited the rugged wilderness of Appalachia, that won't be much of a shock.

All in all, this was a really fun assignment, and I look forward to continue playing around with the Web Soil Survey to uncover more about the Joyce Kilmer Forest and about Southern Appalachia at large.