The maps provided through this website contain many of the features required for a compliant NRCS 590 nutrient management plan under ATCP 50. Several required landscape features are not included in these maps, such as wells and locally identified features that serve as direct conduits to groundwater. Field verification of all landscape features is required!

The maps available from this website are in GeoPDF format. The TerraGo Desktop (download link above) converts your downloaded map from a simple image into an abridged Geographical Information System (GIS), allowing you to hide and display layers, measure distance and areas, and other useful functions.

Issues Encountered With Some GeoPDFs

The Problem

GeoPDF files for some counties do not work correctly with recent versions of Adobe Reader. In particular, you may not be able to annotate the PDFs. You may see an error message like:

The document enabled extended features in Adobe Reader. The document has been changed since it was created and use of extended features is no longer available. Please contact the author for the original version of this document.

The Reason

During the production of our maps (a process which took several months), Adobe made changes to Reader which caused the error. TerraGo, the company that invented GeoPDFs, came out with a patch, but too late to help the thousands of maps we'd already produced. (Maps created subsequent to the patch are fine.)

How We're Fixing It

We're currently gearing up to refresh all our maps, adding new features, correcting problems, and in general improving them. Of course, we'll use the fixed GeoPDF technology for all the new maps, so when we're done, all maps will work as intended.

Until then, if you need one of the maps that's broken, the only way to have access to all GeoPDF features is to revert to Adobe Reader 9.0.

The Workaround: Back to Adobe Reader 9.0

  1. Obtain the previous version of Reader:
    • Go to BrotherSoft.
    • Go to "Click to download", next to "US Mirror" (click the screen shot to see a larger version):
    • Click the link
    • Save the file (and remember where you put it!)
  2. From the Windows Control Panel (Start|Settings), select Add/Remove Programs.
  3. Choose Adober Reader (9.1 or 9.2, whichever you have) and uninstall it.
  4. Double-click the file you downloaded in Step One to install Adobe Reader 9.0.