Soil Pit

O Horizon (0 – 5 cm): Mainly organic material. This was the upper most horizon, filled with decomposing leaves, needles and broken sticks. This was the darkest colored horizon through the entire soil pit profile.

A Horizon (5 – 25 cm): The A horizon exhibited a dark gray color, not as dark as O horizon. The layer consisted of some roots. This horizon was formed due to leaching from above water and organics combining with the lower B horizon and decomposing overtime. The material was very fine and flakey.

B Horizon (25 – 55cm): Shows a transition. This is most likely from leaching of water from the surface above, tricking down through to this horizon. Since the transition is a bit gradual and not a straight line, we can say that this area probably has been affected by humans before, but not as much as other areas. Horizon B starts of with the grayish color and transitions to a lighter reddish-yellow throughout the horizon. This layer is loaded with roots. This reddish-yellow color is most likely a result of the water not being able to percolate down and create actual soil, therefore it’s a mix of till from horizon c and soil organics from above.

C Horizon 55 – 100 cm): Horizon C consisted of sand and small pebbles. This layer is known as the parent layer and most likely deposited during the last glacial period during when large ice sheets extended over Vermont. The horizon has a very beige color, with grains of sand visible and small pieces of gravel, indicating that this is indeed of glacial origin. (See photo of different material outside the pit to compare.)

In terms of development of this soil, it seems to be that since there was no "E" layer this area has likely been affected once or twice in history by humans. Nevertheless, the soil profile showed a gradual transition from A to B indicating that there hasn't been a lot of human impact such as plowing which would make the transition line sharp. However, there could have been a plow occurrence once a long time ago. There were also a few larger trees intermixed with a much younger forest, thats another piece of evidence that I think this area has been disturbed, nevertheless, it must have been a long time ago. Since the last disturbance, the amount of leaves being dropped is creating a light gray A horizon. Eventually, if this area is not disturbed, a E horizon will develop. Another important thing to not about this soil profile is that the B horizon was not very red. This could be the result of two things, the first being that the actual soil is not that old, relatively young. Another reason why the B is not that red could be the fact that not enough water is making it down to create actual soil yet, therefore, it's a mix of decomposing A horizon material and some parent material or glacial till. The bottom horizon (C), is the parent material which was made up up glacial till, most likely from the retreat of the last glaciation or could be apart of glacial lake VT which is apart of Vermont's glacial history.