GIS Applications in Agriculture, Volume Four: Conservation Planning, edited by Tom Mueller and Gretchen F. Sassenrath, is the fourth volume in the book series GIS Applications in Agriculture, which is designed to enhance the application and use of geographic information systems (GISs) in agriculture by providing detailed GIS applications that are useful to scientists, educators, students, consultants, and farmers. The first volume, GIS Applications in Agriculture, edited by Francis J. Pierce and David Clay, was published by CRC Press in 2007. The second volume, GIS Applications in Agriculture: Nutrient Management for Improved Energy Efficiency, edited by David Clay and John Shanahan, and the third volume, GIS Applications in Agriculture: Invasive Species, edited by Sharon Clay, were published by CRC Press in 2011. While the newest book in this series, the idea of a book on conservation planning using GIS was identified in 2007 when the book series began. Intuitively, conservation planning through GIS applications should appeal to all conservationists who clearly understand that a key to achieving soil and water conservation is rooted in an understanding of the spatial and temporal variation in both soil and water resources and natural and human-induced forces that affect the quality and quantity of those resources. <...>

Geography has always been important to humans. Stone-age hunters anticipated the location of their quarry, early explorers lived or died by their knowledge of geography, and current societies work and play based on their understanding of who belongs where. Applied geography, in the form of maps and spatial information, has served discovery, planning, cooperation, and conflict for at least the past 3000 years (Figure 1-1). Maps are among the most beautiful and useful documents of human civilization.

GIS Tutorial 1: Basic Workbook is the direct result of the authors' experiences teaching GIS to high school students in a summer program at Carnegie Mellon University, undergraduate and graduate students in several departments and disciplines at Carnegie Mellon University, as well as working professionals. GIS Tutorial 1 is a hands-on workbook with step-by-step exercises that take the reader from the basics of using ArcGlS Desktop interfaces through performing advanced spatial analyses. <...>

In the preface for the First Edition of Glacial Geology we wrote that this book is the product of two things; an enthusiasm for glacial geology and a perceived need for a student text with which to stimulate this enthusiasm in others. Thirteen years on we still believe this to be the case. The First Edition has sold well and has been well-received by undergraduates studying the subject. In the First Edition of Glacial Geology we also wrote that the aim of the book is simple: to provide an account of glacial geology which is accessible to undergraduates and uncluttered from unnecessary detail. Although we have taken the opportunity to update and revise a lot of the content in this Second Edition, reflecting new developments in the subject, we have tried to stay true to this original aim. We hope you will still find this an accessible and helpful treatment of the subject and that by reading this book you will share some of our enthusiasm for glacial geology. <...>