Major update of S-map Online
S-map Online, a tool developed and updated by Manaaki Whenua - Landcare Research, provides the best available soil survey data for New Zealand.
Changes in this update
This email is to notify S-map users of a significant nationwide update on 23rd April 2024. This update contains a new improved model for estimating soil hydrological properties (including Available Water). The new model is based on a significant increase in the number of laboratory datapoints (now 5956 samples from 797 sites spread across New Zealand). Much richer soils data means much better modelling assumptions, which in turn support better decision-making. More accurate soil moisture information will lead to better knowledge of irrigation demand and nutrient losses.
Because this is the release of a new national model, all soils in S-map have new estimates of Available Water.
In general, the estimates of Available Water have increased for siblings in most soil orders, except for a decrease for Granular and Allophanic soils.
The impact of the new soil moisture information has been tested in OverseerFM by comparing the nutrient loss results from 6,492 farms. Of these, the Overseer team report that 76% have a change in estimated nitrogen losses of less than ±10%, but 0.05% will see an increase of more than 20% in the estimated nitrogen loss/ha.
NOTE: Overseer will NOT be automatically updating all analyses within OverseerFM as would be done for an Overseer version change. OverseerFM users will be able to check and update their own soil information.
