New Zealand Journal of Geology and Geophysics abstracts
Modelling loess landscapes for the South Island, New Zealand, based
on expert knowledge
Jochen Schmidt1*
Peter C. Almond2
Les Basher1
Sam Carrick1
Allan E. Hewitt1
Ian H. Lynn1
Trevor H. Webb1
1Landcare Research NZ Ltd
P.O. Box 69
Lincoln, New Zealand
2Soil and Physical Sciences Group
Division of Soil, Plant and Ecological Sciences
Lincoln University
P.O. Box 84
Lincoln, New Zealand
*Present address: National Institute of Water and Atmospheric
Research (NIWA), P.O. Box 8602, Christchurch, New Zealand.
Abstract In New Zealand, occurrence of loess often
determines the spatial pattern of soil depth, and influences
droughtiness, leaching potential, organic matter accumulation, nutrient
retention, and natural plant-species distribution. Understanding loess
distribution is therefore a major prerequisite for soil and land
resource management. Although New Zealand’s soil scientists have
accumulated a good empirical knowledge of loess distribution through
several decades of field investigation, only some of this knowledge is
recorded in papers and reports. This study estimates loess thickness
and percent cover, and provides loess landscape models for the internal
loess distribution of all land units in the South Island based on
expert knowledge. We derived loess depth classes and percent cover
classes and assembled land units with similar loess distribution
patterns. The soil sets underpinning the map units of the New Zealand
Land Resource Inventory (NZLRI) were classified according to loess
depth, loess cover, and loess pattern. New loess maps of the South
Island were produced from those classifications, displaying loess
coverage, thickness, loess pattern, and loess landscapes. These maps
present our current knowledge of the coarse-scale loess distribution
and provide a framework for fine-scale loess landscape modelling.
Keywords loess; soil-landscapes; expert models;
Geo-Information Systems (GIS); South Island; New Zealand
G04009; O
Received 24 February 2004; accepted 7 July 2004; nline publication date
23 March 2005
New Zealand Journal of Geology & Geophysics, 2005, Vol. 48:
117–133
0028–8306/05/4801–0117 © The Royal Society of New Zealand 2005
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