Alfisols are a soil order in USDA soil taxonomy.

Alfisols form in semiarid to humid areas, typically under a hardwood forest cover. They have a clay-enriched subsoil and relatively high native fertility. "Alf" refers to aluminium (Al) and iron (Fe). Because of their productivity and abundance, the Alfisols represent one of the more important soil orders for food and fiber production. They are widely used both in agriculture and forestry, and are generally easier to keep fertile than other humid-climate soils. Found in Ohio River basin in the United States, southern and unglaciated Western Europe, the Baltic region and central European Russia, the drier parts of Peninsular India, Sudan in Africa, and many parts of South America. In USDA soil taxonomy, Andisols are soils formed in volcanic ash and defined as soils containing high proportions of glass and amorphous colloidal materials. Because they are generally quite young, Andisols typically are very fertile except in cases where phosphorus is easily fixed (this sometimes occurs in the tropics). They can usually support intensive cropping, with areas used for wet rice in Java supporting some of the densest populations in the world. Other Andisol areas support crops of fruit,maize, tea, coffee or tobacco. Most occur around the Pacific Ring of Fire, with the largest areas found in central Chile, Ecuador, Colombia, Mexico, the Pacific Northwest USA, Japan, Java and New Zealand's North Island. Aridisols (from the Latin aridus, for dry) form in an arid or semi-arid climate. Aridisols dominate thedeserts and xeric shrublands, which occupy about one third of the Earth's land surface. Aridisols have a very low concentration of organic matter, reflecting the paucity of vegetative production on these dry soils. Water deficiency is the major defining characteristic of Aridisols. entisols are defined as soils that do not show any profile development other than an A horizon. An entisol has no diagnostic horizons, and most are basically unaltered from their parent material, which can be unconsolidated sediment orrock. Entisols are the second most abundant soil order (after inceptisols), occupying about 16% of the global ice-free land area. Causes of delayed or absent development Erosion - common on shoulder slopes; other kinds also important. Deposition - continuous, repeated deposition of new parent materials by water, wind, colluvium, mudflows, other means. Flooding or saturation. Cold climate - must not be sufficiently cold in winter for permafrost. Dry climate. Shallow to bedrock - may be rock resistant to weathering, such as quartzite or ironstone. Toxic parent materials - serpentine soil, mine spoils, sulfidic clays.

Gelisols are an order in USDA soil taxonomy. They are soils of very cold climates which are defined as containing permafrost within two meters of the soil surface. The word "gelisol" comes from the Latin gelare meaning "to freeze", a reference to the process of cryoturbation that occurs from the alternating thawing and freezing characteristic of gelisols. Structurally, gelisols have no B horizon and have an A horizon resting on the permafrost. Because soil organic matter accumulates in the upper layer, most gelisols are black or dark brown in soil color, followed by a shallow mineral layer. Despite the influence of glaciation in most areas where gelisols occur, chemically they are not highly fertile because nutrients, especially calcium and potassium, are very easily leached above the permafrost. Gelisols are found chiefly in Siberia, Alaska and Canada. Smaller areas are found in theAndes (mainly near the intersection between Chile, Bolivia and Argentina), Tibet, northern Scandinavia and the ice-free parts of Greenland and Antarctica

a histosol is a soilconsisting primarily of organic materials. They are defined as having 40 centimetres (16 in) or more of organic soil material in the upper 80 centimetres (31 in). Organic soil material has an organic carbon content (by weight) of 12 to 18 percent, or more, depending on the clay content of the soil. histosols have very low bulk density and are poorly drained because the organic matter holds water very well. Most are acidic and many are very deficient in major plant nutrients which are washed away in the consistently moist soil. Histosols form whenever organic matter forms at a more rapid rate than it is destroyed. This occurs because of restricted drainage precluding aerobic decomposition, and the remains of plants and animals remain within the soil. Thus, histosols are very importantecologically because they, and gelisols, store large quantities of organic carbon. If accumulation continues for a long enough period, coal forms. Most histosols occur in Canada, Scandinavia, the West Siberian Plain, Sumatra,Borneo and New Guinea. Smaller areas are found in other parts of Europe, the Russian Far East (chiefly in Khabarovsk Krai and Amur Oblast), Florida and other areas of permanent swampland.. Histosols are generally very difficult to cultivate because of the poor drainage and often low chemical fertility. However, histosols formed on very recent glacial lands can often be very productive when drained and produce high-grade pasture for dairying or beef cattle. Inceptisols are a soil order in USDA soil taxonomy. They form quickly through alteration of parent material. They are older than entisols. They have no accumulation of clays, iron oxide, aluminium oxide or organic matter. They have an ochric or umbric horizon and a cambic subsurface horizon. a vertisol is a soil in which there is a high content of expansive clay known as montmorillonite that forms deep cracks in drier seasons or years. Alternate shrinking and swelling causes self-mulching, where the soil material consistently mixes itself, causing vertisols to have an extremely deep A horizon and no B horizon. Vertisols typically form from highly basic rocks, such as basalt, in climates that are seasonally humid or subject to erratic droughts and floods, or to impeded drainage. Depending on the parent material and the climate, they can range from grey or red to the more familiar deep black Major areas where vertisols are dominant are eastern Australia (especially inland Queensland and New South Wales), the Deccan Plateau of India, and parts of southern Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, andChad (the Gezira), and the lower Paran River in South America. Other areas where vertisols are dominant include southern Texas and adjacent Mexico, central India, northeast Nigeria, Thrace, New Caledonia and parts of eastern China. The natural vegetation of vertisols is grassland, savanna, or grassy woodland. The heavy texture and unstable behaviour of the soil makes it difficult for many tree species to grow, and forest is uncommon.The shrinking and swelling of vertisols can damage buildings and roads, leading to extensive subsidence. Vertisols are generally used for grazing of cattle or sheep. It is not unknown for livestock to be injured through falling into cracks in dry periods. Conversely, many wild and domestic ungulates do not like to move on this soil when inundated. However, the shrink-swell activity allows rapid recovery from compaction.When irrigation is available, crops such as cotton, wheat, sorghum and rice can be grown. Vertisols are especially suitable for rice because they are almost impermeable when saturated. Rainfed farming is very difficult because vertisols can be worked only under a very narrow range of moisture conditions: they are very hard when dry and very sticky when wet. Ultisols, commonly known as red clay soils, are one of twelve soil orders in the United States Department of Agriculture soil taxonomy. They are defined as mineral soils which contain no calcareous material anywhere within the soil, have less than 10% weatherable minerals in the extreme top layer of soil, and have less than 35% basesaturation throughout the soil. Ultisols occur in humid temperate or tropical regions. The word "Ultisol" is derived from "ultimate", because Ultisols were seen as the ultimate product of continuous weathering of minerals in a humid, temperate climate

without new soil formation via glaciation. Ultisols are the dominant soils in the Southern United States (where the Cecil series is most famous), southeastern China, Southeast Asia and some other subtropical and tropical areas. podzols (known as Spodosols in China and the United States of America, Espodossolos in Brazil, and Podosols in Australia) are the typical soils ofconiferous, or boreal forests. They are also the typical soils of eucalypt forests andheathlands in southern Australia, while in Western Europe podzols develop onheathland, which is a often construct of human interference through grazing and burning. Podzol is Russian for "under ash" (/pod=under, /zola=ash) and likely refers to the common experience of Russian peasants of plowing up an apparent under-layer of ash (leached or E horizon) during first plowing of a virgin soil of this type.Podzols are found in areas that are wet and cold (for example in Northern Ontario orRussia) and also in warm areas such as Florida (humic variant of the northern podzol or Humod), southern Australia and parts of South America. Most Podzols are poor soils for agriculture due to the sandy portion, resulting in a low level of moisture and nutrients. Some are sandy and excessively drained. Others have shallow rooting zones and poor drainage due to subsoil cementation. A low pH further compounds issues, along with phosphate deficiencies and aluminium toxicity. The best agricultural use of Podzols is for grazing[2]; although welldrained loamy types can be very productive for crops if lime and fertilizer are used. Oxisols are an order in USDA soil taxonomy, best known for their occurrence in tropicalrain forest, 15-25 degrees north and south of the Equator. Some oxisols have been previously classified as laterite soils. The main processes of soil formation of oxisols are weathering, humification andpedoturbation due to animals. These processes produce the characteristic soil profile. They are defined as soils containing at all depths no more than 10 percent weatherableminerals, and low cation exchange capacity. Oxisols are always a red or yellowish color, due to the high concentration of iron(III) and aluminium oxides and hydroxides. In addition they also contain quartz and kaolin, plus small amounts of other clay minerals and organic matter. exclusively in tropical areas, in South America and Africa, almost always on highly stable continental cratons. In Southeast Asia, oxisols are found on remnants of the Cimmerian microcontinent, Oxisols are often used for tropical crops such as cocoa and rubber. In some cases, rice is grown on them. Permanent cropping of oxisols in low-income areas is very difficult because of low cation exchange capacities and high phosphorus fixation on iron and aluminium oxides (ligand exchange mechanism; inner sphere complex with phosphate). However, many oxisols can be cultivated over a wide range of moisture conditions. On this account, oxisols are intensively exploited for agriculture in some regions which have enough wealth to support modern agricultural practices (including regular additions of lime and fertilizer). A recent example of exploitation by modern methods involves the growing of soybeans in Brazil Mollisols form in semi-arid to semi-humid areas, typically under a grassland cover. They are most commonly found in the mid-latitudes, namely in North America, mostly east of the Rocky Mountains, in South America in Argentina (Pampas) and Brazil, and in Asia in Mongolia and the RussianSteppes. Their parent material is typically base-rich and calcareous and include limestone,loess, or windblown sand. The main processes that lead to the formation of grassland Mollisols are melanisation, decomposition, humification and pedoturbation. Mollisols have deep, high organic matter, nutrient-enriched surface soil (A horizon), typically between 6080 cm in depth. This fertile surface horizon, known as a mollic epipedon, is the defining diagnostic feature of Mollisols. Mollic epipedons result from the long-term addition of organic materials derived from plant roots, and typically have soft, granular, soil structure. Mollisols occur in savannahs and mountain valleys