Pick the zone method a field actually needs — not the one you're stuck with.
Composite Zones read the satellite's crop-vigor imagery with the method and count you choose. One-click Performance Zones turn years of history into a map that stands on its own. Terrain refinement narrows the wettest and driest ground only on fields where it's worth the extra pass. Tidy the result by hand, then export it in whatever format the job calls for.
From field boundary to field-ready zones.
Boundary in, satellite history fetched, seasons reviewed — then one of three paths, tidied by hand, and out to a report, a GIS file, or a rate map. Every path starts the same way and ends the same way; only the middle changes.
Landscape Response is also available straight from Composite or Performance Zones, once elevation is loaded — it doesn't wait on either being finished first.
Start from the field in front of you, not from the menu.
Every method on this page answers a different question a grower asks. Here's which one fits which field, and the sentence you'll be able to say once it has run.
| The field | The method | What you can tell the grower |
|---|---|---|
| A field with four or more good seasons behind it, and you want the zones to stand on their own. | Performance ZonesOne click. Graded on the same scale on every field. | This strip has run below the rest of the field most years. That's not one bad season, that's the pattern. |
| The field has only two or three usable seasons on file, or you want to choose how the zones get split yourself. | Composite ZonesThe classic method. You choose the method and the count. | There are only three seasons to go on, so I picked the method and the count myself. Here's what the peak of each one says. |
| One low zone is dragging the map down, and the ground rolls. | Terrain refinementSplits one zone by wetter and drier ground. Preview first. | The poor ground is really two things: the wet run through the middle, and the dry knoll. They want different rates. |
| You suspect the lay of the land explains most of what you're seeing. | Landscape ResponseWhole field, position against performance. Needs elevation. | The low ground is low because water sits there. The hilltop is thin because it dries out first. The zones follow that. |
| A storm went through last week, or the crop looks off and you're not sure where. | In-SeasonFresh scenes, damage estimates, included. | Here's the field the day after the hail, next to the week before, and the acres by how hard each one was hit. |
Whichever method built the map, you can merge zones down to the count the grower's controller needs. And when you run Performance Zones, the field itself does the talking: one that performs alike comes back in one band instead of five, and the zone history under the result shows how often each zone repeated across the seasons on record.
Add precision only where a field earns it.
Composite Zones: you pick the method and the count.
Draw or upload a boundary and TerraZoner builds zones from that field's peak-season imagery. Set the classification method and the number of zones, and you get exactly that count — the right tool when the field has fewer than four usable seasons, or when you want a particular method behind the lines. It draws that many zones whether or not the field has the difference to justify them. And a set count isn't what this method is for: any zone map, this one or Performance Zones, can be merged down to the number a grower wants. The crop-vigor reading behind it is EVI2 by default: the classic reading, NDVI, tops out once a crop gets thick, so the best acres in a canola or corn field can all read the same. EVI2 keeps telling those acres apart. NDVI (classic) is still one click away.
One click, and years of history become a zone map.
Performance Zones is one click — no settings to pick. It needs four or more usable seasons of imagery, and it shows how every part of the field has performed against the field average, graded on the same scale on every field, so "Average" means the same thing on this farm as it does on the neighbour's. A uniform field can honestly come back as one or two zones — that's the tool telling you the field doesn't need splitting. One odd season can't drag the lines on its own. The zone history shows how steadily each area has performed.
Refine the zone that's actually giving you trouble.
Not every field needs a terrain pass. When one zone is dragging the map down, merge the low zones into one and run a refine preview — it splits that zone into wetter and drier ground and shows you the split before anything changes, so you can decide if it's worth acting on.
A whole-field read on position, in one pass.
Landscape Response lines up where a field sits — high ground, low ground, slope — against how it has performed, across the whole field in one pass, once elevation is loaded for it. It works from the field's crop-vigor history and the terrain, and it doesn't need EC data. Run it on its own whenever position might explain what you're seeing — it doesn't wait on Performance Zones being built first.
Got EC on the field? Bring it in.
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Zones from EC, or EC against the imagery.
Upload the EC survey as a zipped point shapefile and build zones from it on its own, or cross it with the field's crop-vigor history and wetness so a salty low spot and a wet low spot stop sharing a zone. Yield, pH and organic matter points load the same way.
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Blend any two layers, at the weight you choose.
Wetness and EC, crop history and EC, whichever pair explains the field. Set the balance between them with one slider and the zones follow. The older grid-style methods are still in the drawer for the operators who use them.
Composite Zones and Performance Zones, side by side.
Same imagery, same field, two different ways of drawing the lines. One splits the field into the count you ask for; the other grades every acre against the field's own average and lets a uniform field come back with fewer zones.
Both stay editable after the fact — merge zones, rename them, or refine the poorest one with elevation if it's worth the pass.
Zones don't have to stay where the math put them.
Fix the odd zone by hand.
Every zone map has one: the one-acre island in the middle of a good zone, or the sliver that obviously belongs with its neighbour. Merge it in or reassign it, right on the map, and undo it if you change your mind.
See the ground the zones are actually responding to.
Tilt the field into 3D and look at the terrain underneath the zone lines — the swale that's pulling water, the knob that's always dry first. It's a quick check before committing to a refine pass, or a clear way to explain a boundary to someone standing in the field.
The map is half the job. What you hand over is the other half.
Every zone map, however it was built, goes out the same five ways. Each one is made to be handed to a grower, an adjuster or a dealer exactly as it is: a report that explains itself, an overlay that opens on a phone, and files that load in whatever they already run.
A report a grower keeps, not a printout of a screen.
Every zone map goes out as a two-page PDF that reads on its own, with the farm and field names on the title and in the file name.
- Page 1: the map, and a legend with each zone's range, acres and average.
- Page 2: what the map is and how it was made, in plain words, beside the zone performance chart. Terrain-refined maps add the wetness versus productivity chart.
- Landscape or portrait, your call at export, so a long narrow field gets a page that fits it.
Open it in Google Earth and click a zone.
Export KML writes the zones themselves, not a picture of them. Every zone draws in the colour it wears in TerraZoner, and clicking one opens a balloon with its name, acres and share of the field, average CPI and range, and its description. Send the file to a grower's phone and the map is in their hand, on their own imagery, with the numbers behind every line.
- Opens in Google Earth on desktop, web and mobile, and in any GIS.
- Renamed zones keep their names. The numbers are the same ones the PDF and shapefile carry.
Build a rate map with the acres already tagged to each rate.
Set up to six products in one prescription and adjust the rate for each zone. The acres that rate covers sit right next to it, so there's no separate area calculation before it goes to the controller, and the product totals are on the PDF before anyone orders.
Files that travel.
For the software the grower, the dealer or the GIS shop already runs. No viewer to install, nothing that only works inside TerraZoner.
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Shapefile
The zone polygons with id, name, acres and CPI as attributes, in WGS84. Loads in FMIS platforms and most equipment monitors.
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GeoTIFF
The zones as a raster for QGIS, ArcGIS and zonal statistics against other layers.
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KMZ map picture
A picture of the map view for Google Earth and GPS apps, for the quick visual when the polygons are not needed.
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Soil sampling.
Place sample points zone by zone on the finished map, track which ones you've visited, and export them as a KML your GPS can navigate.
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Project backup.
Save the whole field project, not just the exported files, so you can reopen it and adjust later instead of starting from scratch.
Before you run the first field.
How many zones will I get?
Up to seven, and only as many as the field actually reaches. The scale is the same on every field, so Average means that ground sat close to the field's own average, not that it landed in the middle of this particular field's range. A variable field can come back with all seven; a uniform one can honestly come back with two or three, or close to one — and when nearly every acre lands in Average, that's the tool telling you this field doesn't justify zoning. Composite Zones, where you set the count yourself, return the number you asked for either way. And whichever method built the map, you can merge zones down to the count the grower wants.
Which crop-vigor reading do the zones use?
EVI2, by default, everywhere in TerraZoner. The classic reading, NDVI, tops out once a crop gets thick, so the best acres in a canola or corn field can all read the same. EVI2 keeps telling those acres apart. NDVI (classic) is still one click away in Composite Zones, and a project built on it before reopens exactly as it was built.
Does elevation data cover my region?
In the US (3DEP) and Canada (HRDEM), TerraZoner pulls it for you wherever public LiDAR covers the field; the Data & Coverage page has a live map to check an area. Where it doesn't, or outside those two countries, upload RTK-quality elevation points and the same terrain tools run on that data instead.
What if a field isn't worth zoning?
Performance Zones grades every part of the field on the same fixed scale. If the field performs alike, it lands almost entirely in one near-average band instead of being split into five, and the result says so in plain words: "Most of this field performs alike. Only small areas stand apart from the field average." That's a straight answer for a client, not a zone map built on a field that didn't need one. Composite Zones has no such check — it draws the count you ask for whether or not the field has the spread to justify it, which is why Performance Zones is the better starting point once a field has four or more usable seasons.
What formats does a finished zone map export to?
A two-page PDF report, a KML for Google Earth with every zone in its map colour and its name, acres and average on click, shapefile, GeoTIFF and a KMZ picture of the map, plus rate-map prescriptions for up to six products and a soil sampling KML placed zone by zone on the same map.
Can I fix a zone if the math got it wrong?
Yes. Merge it into the zone next door or reassign it by hand, right on the map, and undo it if you change your mind.
Find out what a field needs before you build anything.
Draw the boundary, then pick Composite Zones, one-click Performance Zones, or add terrain refinement — whichever the field actually calls for.
Start zoningPerformance Zones grades on the same fixed scale every time, so a uniform field can say so before you draw a line.