The Soil Map 1 : 1,000,000 (BUEK1000) has been available since 1995 and is the first soil map for the whole of Germany. It was compiled on the basis of general maps of the old and new federal states and depicts the distribution and properties of the soils in Germany, basing on a standardised soil classification system.
The BUEK1000 is available in printed form together with an explanatory booklet. Moreover, the geometric and content-related information is also provided digitally in the database of the soil information system (FISBo BGR) and is updated on an ongoing basis.
In addition to the digital map graphics, the product components include in the explanatory booklet a short legend as well as a detailed legend with 72 mapping units and reference soil profiles. The description of the latter provides, among other things, information on the soil inventory, the parent material, soil texture, water conditions and soil properties.
In order to cope with the multitude of use cases and of user requirements, BGR has developed various follow-up products based on the BUEK1000, e. g. smaller-scale, easier-to-read maps for national atlases, or landuse-differentiated soil maps, in which the typical soils for the main types of land use are described, i. e. grassland, forest and arable land.
Overview of the BUEK1000 follow-up products
1. Inclusion of land use data and supplementation of additional soil parameters
- Landuse-stratified soil map 1 : 1,000,000 (BUEK1000N)
- Landuse-stratified soil map 1 : 2,000,000 (BUEK2000N)
2. Aggregation and generalisation to derive small-scale soil maps e.g. for popular scientific tasks and school education
- Soil Map 1 : 2,000,000, BUEK2000 (Hydrological Atlas)
- Soil map 1 : 3,000,000, BUEK3000 (National Atlas)
- Soil map 1 : 5,000,000, BUEK5000 (school atlas)
3. Thematic maps based on evaluations of the soil profile datasets and their cartographic representation