Soil Sample

The soil in my area turned out to be a loamy sand due to its ability to form a ball but inability to withstand a “bounce” lol. This characterizes it as being made of large particles that create an environment susceptible to water loss due to the draining of water between the individual soil particles. Therefore, the nutrients in the water also probably drain through the soil quickly and escape the grasps of the many organisms in the soil.

 

The location where I grabbed the soil contained weeds, grasses, mosses, insects, worms, and some bushes. These organisms all directly or indirectly take nutrients from the soil and incorporate it into their life processes as anatomical features, metabolic energy, or storage molecules for future use (to name a few). In the end, they also give back everything stored within their body when they die and are decomposed by organisms in the soil.

 

The soil is most definitely eroded where I took the sample. It was clear that water flows down into the water basin and in the process washes out many of the decaying organic material and associated nutrients into the water source instead of allowing them to sink into the soil for those organisms. The location that receives all of these nutrients probably has a greater ability to sustain more biological life due to its higher concentrations of run-off nutrients from the surrounding areas.

Done