The Funk Library holds the vast majority of published USDA county soil survey maps. These are primarily surveys of single counties, though some include only a section of a county while others include parts of many counties.

The surveys have been assigned various call numbers at the Funk Library. All U.S. county surveys taken between 1899-1922 were published by the U.S. Bureau of Soils as one continuous series. These are arranged by year and located under call number 631UN36. U.S. county surveys published from 1923 to 1966 were published by the USDA Bureau of Chemistry and Soils. These were also published as one continuous series, and are arranged by year under the call number 631UN37S. In 1966 the USDA Soil Conservation Service, in cooperation with state agricultural experiment stations, began publishing soil surveys. These surveys are published as individual state series, and each state series has been assigned its own call number.

As one might guess, finding soil surveys at the Funk Library can be complicated. This database has been designed to aid people in finding the published survey for a county at the Funk Library. All records contain call number locations. Records for the earlier series include the publication years, whereas records for surveys published as part of a state series include the volume numbers within the series. If no survey is available this information is provided. Additionally, this database locates survey cross-references. This is especially helpful in the case that a soil survey has not been published for a county or area, as one can see if another county survey includes a part of it.

Help is available for searching the UIUC Soil Survey Database.

More information and some current online soil survey manuscripts are available from the web site of Natural Resources Conservation Service, including a List of Printed Soil Surveys by State - past and present.