Soil particles

The soil material of the earth's surface is usually not present as a continuum , but in the form of soil particles, as soil particles . These granular particles consist of inorganic materials such as rock fragments and mineral particles, of organic plant residues that are more or less strongly rebuilt and decomposed and the breakdown products of the soil organisms ( Edaphon ).

According to their size, the soil particles are divided into the grain sizes sand, silt and clay. The soil particles aggregate into larger units through the coagulation of clay minerals and through the formation of clay-humus-oxide complexes . This creates a high-quality soil structure for plant cultivation . In order to determine the chemical binding capacity of the soil particles for cations, which are essential for plant nutrition, the cation exchange capacity (KAK) of the soil particles is determined using analytical methods such as NH ₄ Cl extraction .

The type of soil particles and their relative size distribution determine the sizes and shapes of the pore volume and thus the air balance and the water holding capacity of the soil.

See also

• Soil type
• Soil water tension
• fertilizer
• Cation exchanger
• Particle measurement technology

swell

• Karl Heinrich Hartge: Introduction to Soil Physics , Stuttgart 1978 ISBN 3-432-89681-6

Web links

• Soil science exercise at TUM ( Memento from January 18, 2004 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF file; 1.60 MB)