Visual Soil Assessment (VSA) Field Guide
The VSA Field Guide contains all the information necessary to cary out VSA on your land. The Guide is self-explanatory and its use does not require special training or technical skills. While the Field Guide contains a wealth of information about soil quality and its fundamental importance to sustainable resource management, the information is expressed in a simple and concise way, and will provide a useful educational tool.
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The VSA Field Guide contains many easy-to-use comparison pictures like these that allow the Visual Score of an indicator, in this case soil structure and consistence under cropping, to be assessed. |
| Good Condition VS=2 Good distribution of friable finer aggregates with no significant clodding. |
Moderate Condition VS=1 Soil contains significant proportions of both coarse firm clods and friable, fine aggregates. |
Poor Condition VS=0 Soil dominated by extremely coarse, very firm clods with very few finer aggregates. |
Availability.
- This publication is being revised and is currently out of print.
- These volumes are available as PDF files for download. Please note - these are large files and may take several minutes to download, depending
on your internet connection.
- Volume 1: Field Guide. cropping and pastoral grazing on flat
to rolling country.
(15.4MB) - Volume 2: Soil Management Guidelines. cropping and pastoral
grazing on flat to rolling country. (4.1MB)
- Volume 3 - Field Guide. Hill country land uses. (9.3 MB)
- Volume 4 - Soil management guidelines. Hill country land uses. (5.4 MB)
- Volume 1: Field Guide. cropping and pastoral grazing on flat
to rolling country.
A separate publication Soil Management Guidelines for Sustainable Cropping (available from Manaaki Whenua Press) uses the same techniques as a basis for sustainable cropping management.
The VSA guides were produced with the co-operation of Horizons Regional Council, Hawke's Bay Regional Council, Ministry for the Environment, Wellington Regional Council, and Landcare Research.