RLS100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Sustainable Organic Integrated Livelihoods, Pedogenesis, Soil Science
11 Sep 2015
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Today"s lecture: what is soil, key concepts and definitions, soil parent materials, key soil characteristics: color, texture, structure. Two basic concepts of soils have evolved through the study of soil as a science: edaphology, pedology, module 1 emphasizes the pedological approach, module 2 and 3 emphasize edaphological studies. Pedology, the study of soils is clearly a very integrative science. Key concept: soils occur at the interface of: Therefore soil science integrates: surficial geology/geomorphology, mineralogy of primary and secondary minerals, hydrologic cycles, physics of water, inorganic and organic chemistry, microbiology, plant biology, ecology. What is soil : 3-dimensional body, system in 3-phases, water, air, solids (organic and mineral) Key concepts: soils do not occur randomly; they do occur in a relatively predictable fashion across the land surface, soil change through time. Simonson (1958) proposed that soil formation could be regarded as three major steps that are integrated: All processes are active to some degree in all soils.
