AOAC SPADA Meeting

Soil Texture

Soil Texture: • Critical to understanding soil behavior • Varies little with time • Impacts water retention  • Impacts gas exchange • Impacts nutrient retention • active fraction of soil (clay) • Silt includes bedrock material and minerals • Sand lest active and less surface area

h ttp://www.soils4teachers.org/files/s4t/texture.pdf

Habitat for Soil Organisms

• Primary Producers • Plants • Moss • Algae • Lichens • Primary Consumers • Herbivores

• Photosynthetic Micobes

• Detritivores (dead leaves) • Saprophytic (dead tissue)

• Secondary Consumers

• Consume Primary Consumers

• Tertiary Consumers • Predators • Microbial feeders • Ecosystem Engineers • Earthworms • Burrowing animals 

• Certain beetles – dung beetle

https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_MEDIA/nrcs142p2_049822.jpg