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Soils Glossary 1
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| aggregate | A group of soil particles cohering in such a way that they behave mechanically as a unit. |
| alluvial fan | A fan shaped deposit of alluvium, laid down by a stream where it emerges from an upland to less steeply sloping terrain |
| alluvium | Material such as clay,silt,sand and gravel deposited by modern rivers and streams |
| auger | a tool for boring into the souil and withdrawing a small sample of soil for observation in the field or laboratory |
| Bed | A unit laye 1cm or more think that is visually or physically more or less distinctly separable from other laywers above and below in a stratified sequence |
| bedrock | The soild rock that underlies the soil and the regolith, ot that is exposed at the surface |
| calcareous soil | Soil containing sufficient calcium carbonate, often with magnesium carbonate, to effervesce visibly with cold 0.1N(10%) hydrochloric acid |
| capillary fringe | A zone of essentially saturated soil just above the water table. The size distribution of the pores determines its extent |
| clay | As a particle size term: a size fraction less than 0.002mm in equivalent diamter |
| Clayey | Containing large amounts of clay, or having properties similar to thoes of clay |
| colloid | A substance in a state of fine subdivision, whose particles are 10-4 to 10-7 in diameter |
| consolidation | the gradual reduction in volume of a soil mass resulting from an increase in compressive stress |
| Deflocculate | To seperate the individual components of compound particles by chemical or physical means or both. To cause the particles of the disperse phase of a colloidal system to become suspended in the dispersion medium |
| delta | A fan shaped area at the mouth of a river formed by deposition of successive layers of sediment brought down from the land and spread out on the bottom of a basin.Where the stream current reaches quiet water. |
| deposit | Material left in a new position by a natural transporting agent such as water,wind, ice or gravity or by the activity of man |
| drumlin | An elongate or oval hill of glacial drift, commonly glacial till, deposited by glacier ice and having its long axis parallel to the direction of ice movemnt |
| dunes | Wild built ridges and hills of sand formed in the same manner as snowdrifts. They are started by some obstruction such as abush, boulder or fence that causes an eddy or otherwise thwarts the sand laden wind. |
| eolian deposit | Sand or silt beposited by the wind |
| erosion | The wearing away of the land surfaces by running water,wind,ice or other geological agents including such processes as gravitational creep. Detachment and movement of soil or rock by water,wind,ice or gravity |
| Erratic | A transported rock fragment different from the bedrock where it lies. The term is generally applied to fragments transported by glacier ice or by floating ice |
| esker | A windling ridge of irregually startifed sand,gravel,and cobbles deposited under the ice by a rapidly flwoing glacial stream |
| Firm | A term describing the constance the consistence of a moist soil that offers disinctly noticeable resistance to crushing, but can be crushed with moderate pressure between the thumb and forefinger |
| flood plain | The land bordering a stream built up of sediments from overflow of the stream and subject to inundation when the stream is a flood stage. |
| flow velocity | The volume of water transferred per unit of time and per unit or area in the direction of the net flow of water in soil |
| fluvial deposits | All sediments, past and present,deposited by flowing water, including glaciofluvial deposits. Wave worked deposites add deposits resulting from sheet erosion and mass wasting area |
| Friable | A consistence term pertaining to the ease of crumbling soils |
| frost action | Freezing and thawing of moisture in materials and the resultant effects on these materials and on the structures of which they are a part or with which they are in contact |
| frost heave | The raising of a surface caused by ice in the underlying soil |
| glacial drift | All rock material carried by glacier ice and glacial meltwater or rafted by licebergs. This term includes till, stratified drift and scattered rock fragments |
| glaciofluvial deposits | Material moved by glaciers and subsequently sorted and deposited by streams flowing fromn the melted ice. The deposits are stratified and may occur in the form of outwash plains,deltas,kames,eskers and kame terraces |
| ground moraine | An unsorted mixture of rocks,bloulders,sand and clay deopisted by glacial ice. The predorminat material is till,but some stratified drift is present. |
| Horizon | A layer of soil or soil material approximately parallel to the land surface. It differs from adjacent genetically related layers in properties such as color, structure,texture, consistance and chemical,biological and mineralogical. |
| hydration | Chemical combination of water with another substance. |
| hydraulic conductivity | The proportionality factor in Darcy's law as applied to the viscous flow of water in a soil, that is, the flux of water per unit gradient of the hydaulic potential. |
| hydrologic cycle | The conditions through which water naturally passes from the time of precipitation unitl it is returned to the atmosphere by evaporation and is ready again to pe precipitated |
| infiltration rate | A soil characteristic determining or describing the maximum rate at which water can enter the soil under specified conditions, including the presence of excess water. |
| inorganic soil | A soil made up mainly of mineral particles (<17% carbon) |
| ion | Atom,group of atoms, or compound that is electircally charged as a result of the loss of electrons(cation) or the gain of electrons (anion) |
| Kame | An irregular ridge or hill of stratified glacial drift deposited by glacial meltwater |
| Kettle | Depression left after the melting of a detached mass of glacier ice buried by drift. |
| lacustrine deposit | Material deposited in the lake water and later exposed either by lowering of the water level or by uplifting of the land. These sediments range in the texture from sand to clays |
| landforms | The various shapes of land surface resulting from a variety of actions such as deposition or sedimentation (eskers,lacustrine basins) erosion (gullies,canyons) and earth curst movements (mountains) |
| leaching | The removal from the soil of materials in solution |
Created by:
cplester
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