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Soil quality reflects how well a soil performs the functions of maintaining biodiversity and productivity, partitioning water and solute flow, filtering and buffering, nutrient cycling, and providing support for plants and other structures. Soil management has a major impact on soil quality. Soil quality relates to soil functions. Unlike water ...
Soil, also commonly referred to as earth, is a mixture of organic matter, minerals, gases, liquids, and organisms that together support the life of plants and soil organisms. Some scientific definitions distinguish dirt from soil by restricting the former term specifically to displaced soil. Soil measuring and surveying device
Soil may be regarded as waterlogged when it is nearly saturated with water much of the time such that its air phase is restricted and anaerobic conditions prevail. In extreme cases of prolonged waterlogging, anaerobiosis occurs, the roots of mesophytes suffer, and the subsurface reducing atmosphere leads to such processes as denitrification ...
Soil bulk density, when determined at standardized moisture conditions, is an estimate of soil compaction. [3] Soil porosity consists of the void part of the soil volume and is occupied by gases or water. Soil consistency is the ability of soil materials to stick together. Soil temperature and colour are self-defining.
They are representative of the level of contamination above which a serious case of soil contamination is deemed to exist. The target values for soil are adjusted for the organic matter ( humus ) content and soil fraction <0.2 μm ( Lutum - Latin, meaning "mud" or "clay").
Fruit and vegetables can be contaminated by high levels of lead in the soils they were grown in. Soil can be contaminated through particulate accumulation from lead in pipes, lead paint, residual emissions from leaded gasoline. [277] The use of lead for water pipes is a problem in areas with soft or acidic water. [278]
The best management approach to these soils is simply to avoid their disturbance. Maintaining vegetation cover of the soil is also important to minimize soil dispersion. [5] In agricultural systems, this may mean making an effort to prevent surface soil loss and/or damage, as the surface soil and ground cover form a protective barrier.
The definition of soil health may vary between users of the term as alternative users may place differing priorities upon the multiple functions of a soil. Therefore, the term soil health can only be understood within the context of the user of the term, and their aspirations of a soil, as well as by the boundary definition of the soil at issue.