This book provides an overview of the distribution, properties, and function of soils in the U.S., including Alaska, Hawaii, and its Caribbean territories. It discusses the history of soil surveys and pedological research in the U.S., and offers general descriptions of the country’s climate, geology and geomorphology. For each Land Resource Region (LRR) – a geographic/ecological region of the country characterized by its own climate, geology, landscapes, soils, and agricultural practices – there is a chapter with details of the climate, geology, geomorphology, pre-settlement and current vegetation, and land use, as well as the distribution and properties of major soils including their genesis, classification, and management challenges. The final chapters address topics such as soils and humans, and the future challenges for soil science and soil surveys in the U.S. Maps of soil distribution, pedon descriptions, profile images, and tables of properties are included throughout the text.

Have agricultural management efforts begun in the desperation of the Dust Bowl brought us to where we need to be tomorrow? Questions about the environmental footprint of farming make this book required reading. Approximately 62% of the total U.S. land area is used for agriculture, and this land also provides critical ecosystem functions. Authors from each region of the continental United States describe the progress of soil and water conservation to date and visualize how agricultural production practices must change in future years to address the newest challenges.

This comprehensive guide of legumes of the Great Plains includes an in-depth description of 114 species with illustrations and distribution maps. It includes more than one hundred similar species with a description of how each differs from the main species.

Population, Land Use, and Environment: Research Directions offers recommendations for future research to improve understanding of how changes in human populations affect the natural environment by means of changes in land use, such as deforestation, urban development, and development of coastal zones. It also features a set of state-of-the-art papers by leading researchers that analyze population-land useenvironment relationships in urban and rural settings in developed and underdeveloped countries and that show how remote sensing and other observational methods are being applied to these issues. This book will serve as a resource for researchers, research funders, and students.

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