What Is The Importance Of Soils?

Soils may be formed in place from rock or formed in weathered rock and minerals that have been transported from where the original rock occurred. Soils may be formed in place from rock or formed in weathered rock and minerals that have been transported from where the original rock occurred. are natural media for the growth of plants. They are mixtures of fragmented and partly or wholly weathered rocks and minerals, organic matter, water, and air, in greatly varying proportions, and live more or less distinct layers or horizons developed under the influence of climate and living organisms.

The cross section of horizons from the surface to the parent material is known as the soil profile. The degree of profile development is dependent on the intensity of the activity of the different soil-forming factors, on the length of time they have been active, and on the nature of the materials from which the soils have developed. Soils are dynamic in character, they are constantly undergoing change but they normally reach a state of near equilibrium with, their environment, after a long period of exposure to a given set of conditions,

Soil colour is also related to soil drainage, with free draining, well AERATED soils (with pore space dominated by oxygen) having rich brown colours. In contrast, poorly draining soils, often referred to as gleys, develop under ANAEROBIC conditions (the pore space dominated by water) and have grey or blue-grey colours. Soils with periodic waterlogging are imperfectly drained and are often highly mottled with blotches of contrasting colour. MOTTLES are often rusty in colour and are due to iron concentration. Such colours are the result of oxidation-reduction; iron is the main substance affected by these processes. If the iron is released in an anaerobic environment, then it stays in the reduced state giving it the grey blue colour of waterlogged