Copyright © 2016 Open Geospatial Consortium.
25 according to its purpose as an ‘instance’ capturing an observation, ‘typical norm’
capturing a description of the expected range of property values in a soil body, or ‘defining norm’ capturing the necessary criteria to be classified as a particular class of
soil. In contrast, INSPIRE uses separate classes to distinguish observed descriptions from derived descriptions. Neither option was tested during the IE.
Name Definition
Data Type Multiplicity
depth The upper nearest to Earths surface
and lower boundary of the described soil or horizon.
MeasureRange One
composition The physical or chemical
composition of a soil. SO_Component
Zero or one relatedSoilFeature
Relates a soil feature to another soil feature.
SO_SoilFeature Relationship
Zero to many relatedObservation
Any observation made on the soil. Observation
Zero to many relatedSamplingFeature
Sampling features related to the soil. May be where the soil was observed
or where one or more samples were taken from the soil.
SamplingFeature Zero to many
9.2.1.2 SO_Soil
The Soil Science Glossary [12] defines a soil as “i The unconsolidated mineral or organic material on the immediate surface of the Earth that serves as a natural medium
for the growth of land plants. ii The unconsolidated mineral or organic matter on the surface of the Earth that has been subjected to and shows effects of genetic and
environmental factors of: climate including water and temperature effects, and macro- and microorganisms, conditioned by relief, acting on parent material over a period of
time. A product-soil differs from the material from which it is derived in many physical, chemical, biological, and morphological properties and characteristics.”
Name Definition
Data Type Multiplicity
depthToRock The depth to rock. Also known as the
R horizon depth or total profile depth. MeasureRange
Zero or one availableWaterCapacity Available water capacity, measured or
computed for a set of specified depth increments using a pedo-transfer
function that references the values estimated for organic carbon, sand, silt,
clay and bulk density. Observation
Zero or one
drainage The local soil wetness conditions. For
example, very poorly drained, poorly drained or well-drained’.
Concept Zero to many
classifier Reference to a classification of a soil
according to a formal soil taxonomy. SO_SoilTaxon
Zero to many horizon
Related soil horizons. SO_Horizon
Zero to many
26
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Although these represent only a limited set of soil properties commonly recorded, they were considered important for the IE use cases providing a variety of data types to test
encodings.
9.2.1.3 SO_Horizon
The Soil Science Glossary defines a soil horizon as a “layer of soil or soil material approximately parallel to the land surface and differing from adjacent genetically related
layers in physical, chemical, and biological properties or characteristics such as color, structure, texture, consistency, kinds and number of organisms present, degree of acidity
or alkalinity, etc.”
Name Definition
Data Type Multiplicity
soil The soil that contains the horizon.
SO_Soil One
