Non-Hydric Soils by Fiat?

The following is the narrative between federal and state wetland folks.

Names and locations have been removed.

Dates are late October 2004.

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Hey, xxxx

Interesting discussion attached here. Hard to believe that a place called the "lower bottoms" in a notoriously low and wet county would even be considered non-wetland.
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Hi xxx:

Can you explain again what was discussed on the WRP tour about lands that were isolated from flooding/hydrology, like by the xxxx Co levee, would not qualify for WRP anymore under new criteria?

xxxxx forwarded me your new proposed ranking criteria.

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Hey xxxx,

Actually, under the way we use to interpret the rules, those areas protected by the levee would not be eligible for WRP. Here is why: The soils that are levee protected used to be considered hydric under the old soil survey based on the overland flow, river inundation during the growing season. Under the new soil survey guidelines, since these sols are now levee protected, and would no longer be flooded by the river, the soil scientist are now mapping these soils as non-hydric/non wetland. Under recent WRP criteria we used for eligibility, we required the soils to be hydric, which means that once the soil scientist re-mapped the soils in xxxx county lower bottoms, they would no longer be hydric and thus not eligible. This was also an issue in xxxxx county where the soil scientist re-mapped soils along the channalizedud river, and where the river use to meander 50 years ago, the channellized river no longer floods the adjacent fields.
What we figured out was the soil scientist are not our (WRP program) friends. They have a different objective/agenda than ours. They want to map current soil conditions. We want to restore historic soil conditions. The moral of the story is that be cautious on how you use the soil survey and now the mapping date.

So in a nuts****, we now view the lower bottoms in xxxx county as eligible for WRP. Clear as mud? Call me if you want to discuss this more xxx-xxx-xxxx

once hydric always hydric

should be mapping soils based on the aquic morphology and not worry about levees, etc. Stating that the soil is almost always protected by levees is a good interpretation, and commonly "protected" phases of soils are mapped. However, it is just this sort of thing that is the reason the National Tech. Comm. on Hydric Soils has decided to determine hydric soils on their morphology, not necessarily whether they have current hydrology. Can you imagine calling all drained wetland soils non-hydric? Soil survey people,in this instance, seem to be out of touch with current policies and procedures. Unfortunate.

The NRCS's own definition of hydric soils is "...soils that formed under conditions of saturation, flooding, or ponding long enough during the growing season to develop anaerobic conditions in the upper part of the soil" (USDA, NRCS. 2003 Field Indicators of Hydric Soils in the United States v5.01). This definition has no indication that the soil must have the future possibility of inundation.