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SOIL GEOMORPHOLOGY
(coined by Ruhe, 1974)
• “The study of soils and their use in evaluating landform evolution and age,
landform stability, surface processes, and past climates” (Margaret Berry)
Petecasso in Lu and Godt, 2013
• New: Schaetzl and Anderson (2005); Holliday (2004, 2006)
SOIL GEOMORPHOLOGY—EARLY DAYS
USGS-MILITARY GEOLOGY UNIT
Morrison
Hunt
Thorp
1941 book ClORPT
Richmond
Ruhe (Battleship Iowa)
Jenny
SOIL GEOMORPHOLOGY—LATER DAYS
GSA
FOP
FIELD TRIPS
Gerson
Tonkin
OVERSEAS VISITORS
1965 INQUA
1965 INQUA
MIDCONTINENT
Ruhe
J. Frye
UNIVERSITIES AND FAMILY TREES—1960s on
FRONT
RANGE
AND
PIEDMONT
WORK
Les McFadden
U. of New Mexico
USGS
Francis Hole
U. of Wisconsin
University of
Colorado
Don Johnson
U. of Illinois
VERY PRODUCTIVE PROGRAMS-USDA
IOWA-50s and 60s
Late Wisconsin
Yarmouth-Sangamon
Late Sangamon
buried soil
Ruhe and Daniels
Modern
South of Adair, Iowa
VERY PRODUCTIVE PROGRAMS-USDA
DESERT RESEARCH PROJECT (NM)—MOST PRODUCTIVE--60s and 70s
Hawley
Hawley and Gile
Plus Grossman, Peterson, Ruhe
Gile
VERY PRODUCTIVE PROGRAMS-USGS
• ACROSS USA, BY USGS AND UNIVERSITIES--70s and 80s
• TO ESTIMATE AGES OF LANDSCAPES
Marchand
Plus Machette, Markewich, Pavich
SOIL DETOUR TO TAXONOMY AND CLASSIFICATION
Harden
SOIL-FORMING FACTORS: PARENT MAT’L (P)
Simple
Complex
Dust
• Local vs. global
Reheis dust traps
• Morrison (1967)
soil-forming intervals
become dust
Dust (A)
B
A
Weathering (B)
Layers—geologic
vs. pedogenic
MAP (mm)
Pye (1987)
ARID
PYE ILLUSTRATED
EPISODIC LOESS/BURIED SOILS
(China)
LOESS/TILL
(New Zealand)
THIN DUST/CARBONATE
REEF (Mare)
TROPICS
ALLUVIUM
(Israel)
FACTORS: TIME(T)
• ALL CLIMATES
COVERED
• QUANTIFY
PROPERTIES
• GLOBAL TIME
TEMPLATE
• MODELS
Progressive-regressive
(Johnson, Watson-Stegner, 1987)
Thresholds (Muhs, 1984)
Martinson et al., 1987
• PATHWAYS:
FIELD DATA
TIME AND CLIMATE
PDI
LAB DATA
Vidic (1997)
from McFadden, 1988
Vidic, 1997
Age (years)
USGS QUATERNARY MAPPING
• Clay mimics Fed
Shroba et al., 2014
TIME AND CLIMATE SUMMARY
Fe
Maximum ~ 60% clay, 10R
(1+ Myr SE USA, Colorado Piedmont)
DRY CLIMATES
DRY, HOT
Machette (1985):
• Stage = age
• Rate varies with ppt,
dust influx, etc (greater
during interglacials)
Gile and Grossman, 1979; Gile and others, 1981
SOILS DETECTING CLIMATE CHANGE
Yaalon’s (1971) persistent horizons: good results with CaCO3
Overlapping
wet-dry
properties
(Btk)
McFadden and
Tinsley (1985)
• Move water curve to right
• Now run this for 2 Myr of
climate change (Reheis, 1987)
Mayer and others, 1988
• Modellers arrive
FACTOR: TOPOGRAPHY (R)
WET CATENAS—NEW ZEALAND
O
E
Bs
C
20 ka
Tonkin and others, 1977
Young and others, 1979
• Massive chemical
redistribution and
removal
Birkeland, 1994
FACTOR: TOPOGRAPHY (R)
• DRY--IDAHO
Fed
20 ka
• Clay ~mimics Fe
• Profiles develop
while slopes flatten
• Use to estimate
slope stability
140 ka
Fed
Berry, 1987
APPLICATIONS—ARCHEOLOGY
LUBBOCK, TX (Holliday, 1985)
RUSSIA
SOILS
• ESSENTIAL FOR STRATIGRAPHY
• SUGGEST AGES AND ENVIRONMENT
APPLICATIONS—
NEOTECTONICS
(McCalpin, 2009)
•
Catena limits age
(McCalpin and Berry, 1996)
% CaCO3
BURIED DOWNFAULTED SOILS
Machette (1978)
Machette, 1978
SOILS AND YUCCA MTN REPOSITORY
CLIMATE CHANGE
GROUNDWATER FLOW
Taylor, 1986
Taylor and Buckins,
1995
Quade and Cerling,
1990
SOILS AND YUCCA MTN REPOSITORY
VOLCANISM
Wells et al., 1990
NTS AND YUCCA MTN
FAULTING
NEW ZEALAND MODEL—EROSION
RATE vs SOIL RESIDENCE TIME
WEST
EAST
Dominant soil profile:
Residence
time:
A/R
A/C
200 yr
A/Bw/C
Tonkin and Basher, 1990
10-20 kyr
SUMMARY
• We have…
You will step on the soil of many countries
Chinese fortune cookie
• …chased down many of Jenny’s Factors
• Jenny was a visionary and would be proud to have
influenced the direction of soil geomorphology
COLORADO FRONT RANGE-estimating
age for surfaces and hillslopes
Surface
Hillslope
• Soil development greater
with lower canyon incision
rates (Dethier et al., 2012)
• Soil on surface vs. canyon
incision rate (0.15 m/kyr)
means relief is increasing
• Can “date” (residence time)
most hillslopes
Hillslope