Soil is our productive living foundation of life

Soil sciences span environmental economic, agricultural, industrial, and recreational advancements

Doing a soil analysis.
Soils take hundreds to thousands of years to form and are vulnerable to degradation from erosion, contamination, industrial disturbance and urban development. Soil is a mixture of minerals, organic materials, air and water, responding to climate, organisms, relief, parent material and time. 

Daniel Hillell in Out of the Earth provides this insight: “Perhaps our most precious and vital source, both physical and spiritual, is the most common matter underfoot which we scarcely even notice and sometimes call “dirt”, but which is in fact the mother-lode of terrestrial life and the purifying medium wherein wastes are decomposed and recycled, and productivity is regenerated”.

Soil is our productive living foundation of life

Soil sciences span environmental economic, agricultural, industrial, and recreational advancements

Soils take hundreds to thousands of years to form and are vulnerable to degradation from erosion, contamination, industrial disturbance and urban development. Soil is a mixture of minerals, organic materials, air and water, responding to climate, organisms, relief, parent material and time. 

Daniel Hillell in Out of the Earth provides this insight: “Perhaps our most precious and vital source, both physical and spiritual, is the most common matter underfoot which we scarcely even notice and sometimes call “dirt”, but which is in fact the mother-lode of terrestrial life and the purifying medium wherein wastes are decomposed and recycled, and productivity is regenerated”.
Doing a soil analysis.
Conducting a soil survey.
In a technical description, topsoil is rich in humus and 10 to 40 cm thick; subsoil is weathered mineral material up to 60 cm thick; the third layer down consists of unaltered parent material.

Pedology is the study of soil as a natural resource including formation; classification; mapping; physical, chemical and biological properties; in relation to use and management. Soil science applications are fundamental to society, spanning economic, agricultural, environmental, industrial, recreational and innovative advancements in Alberta and throughout Canada.
Assessment of reclaimed soil site.
Soil inspection for reclamation certificate application at the TransAlta mine, Wabamun.
Alberta Soils

Most Canadian soils developed on deposits from the last glacial period that ended about 10,000 years ago. The surficial geology map of Alberta shows parent materials are mainly moraine (till), deposited by glacial ice. Other materials are glaciofluvial, deposited by glacial meltwater in floodplains; glaciolacustrine, deposited by glacial meltwater in lakes; eolian, wind deposits of sand-sized particles; fluvial, deposited from flowing water; colluvium, found on steep slopes derived from local sources; and organic, accumulated plant and animal matter.
Parent material strongly influences soil properties. Over centuries, vegetation and climate, especially temperature and precipitation, affect soil formation and characteristics. Maps of Natural Subregions of Alberta and Soil Groups of Alberta show similar zonation from the warm, dry southeast to the cool, moist north.  

The Canadian System of Soil Classification has 10 orders reflecting dominant soil-forming processes; 31 great groups indicating soil-forming process strength; 100s of subgroups based on horizon kind and arrangement; and 1000s of series, basic units used in mapping soils and making interpretations for land use, management and reclamation.
In 1987 the Alberta Soil Inventory Subcommittee developed a standardized catalogue. The province is subdivided into 24 soil correlation areas (SCAs), reflecting agroclimatic conditions integrated with soil development, use and management. SCA boundaries coincide with climate zones and natural area boundaries. Soil series names are applied in detailed mapping purposes. Series are used in land reclamation to assess soil quality and determine handling for horizon salvage and replacement. 

The reclaimed landscape is mapped in detail and information used to apply for a reclamation certificate, indicating soil quality or equivalent capability has been attained.
A soil profile overlying a natural gravelly deposit containing fragments of bitumen.