How to sample

Soil Submission

For solid samples, such as soil, sediments, solid products

1. Mailing address – The soil report will be sent here. We mail only one hard copy to one address. The fastest way to receive your test results is by email. Please include an email address.
2. Billing address – If no separate billing address is provided, the bill will be sent to the same address as the report.
3. Payment method – Must be marked or samples will not be assessed until we have payment information.
4. Sample Identifier – Every sample must have a unique identification code. If you do not provide one, we will create one for each of your samples.
5. Field, Treatment – Tell us what field, or treatment or other information makes these different samples, such as North, East, or A, B, or With/Without, Poor/Good, Up/Down, Soil type 1 versus 2, conventional versus sustainable.
6. Date Sample Taken – The samples should arrive within 3 days of being taken from the original habitat. If you sample on May 5 and the samples don’t arrive at the lab until May 10, there is little reason to assess active organisms, because activity will have changed from what was going on in the field.
7. Existing or Desired Crop/Plants – We base our interpretation on the plant you want to have. If you have Bermuda grass, and you want bunchgrass, tell us you want bunchgrass so we tell you want you need to fix. If you say Bermuda, we’ll let you know things are great for Bermuda (if they are), and not tell you what you really want to know!
8. Soil Type – Sand, silt, clay fractions, plus the relative amount of organic matter determine soil type. We really just need to have an idea of the sand, silt, clay that is in the soil.
9. Is the area irrigated or not? If possible, indicate type of irrigation – sprinkler, flood, pivot, drip, etc.
10. Percent organic matter - Indicate organic matter (OM) level, if known. Most agricultural soils after a few years of conventional farming have less than 0.5% organic matter remaining, while lawns have 2 to 3%, and natural systems contain higher levels, up to 15% or more OM.
11. Climate Zone – Coastal, Mediterranean; soils freeze in winter, soil never freezes, arid, semiarid, wetland, riparian, sediment.
12. Sample was taken in the summer, spring, winter, autumn. Expected organism activity changes significantly with the change from season and we aren’t always aware that it’s still winter in Australia, or South Africa.
13. Disease/Pest Control methods – Continue this on the back of the page if necessary. What pesticides, herbicides, or fertilizers (including organic) have been used?
14. Other Management Practices – Put on back of form.
15. Assays that you want us to perform – Select each assay you want to do. If you want to do active bacteria, total bacteria, active fungi and total fungi then there is a discount over that same set of samples run individually. The total foodweb, which is all 7 assays as perform on soil, is a further discount.