El mapa de cobertes del sòl d'Andorra

(ENG) Land cover map of Andorra The land cover map of Andorra (Mapa de cobertes del sòl d'Andorra, MCSA) is an initiative taken by the Biodiversity Centre in the Institut d'Estudis Andorrans (Andorran Research Institute) with the collaboration of the Centre de Recerca Ecològica i Aplicacions Forestals (Centre of Ecological Research and Forest Applications). The MCSAillustrates all the soil types (14 units) present throughout Andorran territory, on a working scale of 1:1000. The identification and localization of the different types has been carried out with the aerial photographs taken in the summer of 1995 and other support mapping documents. For these types of maps, a compromise is needed between detailed mapping (working scale of 1:1000) and a simple yet complete legend. An increase in the complexity of the legend (more units which would be difficult to differentiate in the photographs) would mean more time and resources needed to produce the map and often ends up reducing the quality of the map in terms of absolute accuracy. For this reason a small legend has been used; one that is sufficient for the type of applications to be carried out and which has allowed a highly reliable map to be made within a year. The MCSA is not a vegetation map, in which the association of vegetation zones are described, neither is it a map of soil uses; it's a map with a simpler legend but with far superior mapping detail and is available nation-wide. One of the immediate uses, due to the precision of the map, is as a support to other maps, particularly the vegetation and soil uses maps, which will lead to mutual enrichment.