At the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), soil and ecological maps and data are at the core of our conservation tools and planning. Yet, the way people manage land can cause soil properties to change in ways that have not traditionally been captured by these data products—until now. Dynamic soil property (DSP) inventories within the Soil Survey Program are advancing the next generation of soil survey to reflect how soils and vegetation change with land use and management.

DSPs are properties that change with land use, management, and natural disturbance on the human time scale. They can change with a single event or over decades, as opposed to inherent soil properties that change over millennia. Some examples of DSPs include roots and pores, soil bulk density, and aggregate stability—properties often associated with soil health.

DSPs connect soil health to soil survey products.

DSP inventories help us interpret soil health through the lens and constraints of geology, climate, and other factors that govern inherent soil properties. However, DSP inventories aren’t only concerned with soil health; they examine plant-soil feedbacks, which shed light on ecological processes. By understanding changes in nutrients, water, and energy processes, we can manage systems holistically and address the root cause of ecosystem degradation, as opposed to the symptoms.