The Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) has recently released a new digitized soil survey of Delaware County that allows for easy access to information about soils and other natural and cultural resources.

The Digital Soil Survey is now available on CD-ROM. The CD’s user-friendly Geographic Information Systems software is compatible with most Windows/Intel home or office computers. The program, which will be particularly useful to farmers and developers, opens with a map of Delaware County.

Users can simply click on the data they would like to see, including aerial photography, roads, towns, slopes, drainage, soil types, and crop yields. The program then redraws the map with the selected information.

The soil project is part of a nationwide Soil Survey Geographic Database Initiative managed by NRCS. The Service, The Ohio State University School of Natural Resources, and ODNR are cooperating on the project with help from the Ohio Department of Transporation, U.S. Forest Service, county SWCDs, and other local agencies.

Delaware County’s computerized soil survey information is certified and is available online at ohiodnr.com.

The CD, which offers many advantages over printed soil surveys, is available through the Delaware SWCD at 740-368-1921.

ODNR also has the One Stop for Ohio Soils Information with more soil resources. One advantage to this method of obtaining a soil survey, over the other methods is that it is a program that gets loaded locally on your own machine and does not require the Internet to access data. This might be a preferred source for users without Internet access or with dial-up service. The aerial photos in this system are not as up-to-date as those available on the DALIS Web. Un-like DALIS Web, you cannot search by address in this system.