Abstract
Many Missouri forest soils exhibit fragipans, which influence soil productivity, ecosystem services and land management. Fragipan bearing soils tend to occur where loess thickness is moderate (1 to 2 meters) or where the soil profile exhibits evidence of mass wasting of weathered limestone residuum. Consensus is consolidating around the self-weight collapse of loess and residuum after repeated wetting and desiccation. The use of gravel as an indicator of parent material differences and its correlation with fragipan development is not perfectly aligned, thus although most fragipans do exhibit a bisequal soil profile, the placement of the lithologic discontinuity is difficult given mass wasting, eluviation-illuviation, side slopes, and other soil processes that contribute to increasing the bulk density and conferring strength. Fragipan genesis is evolving; however, research involving Ecosystem Site Descriptions are a fusion of a land parcel’s soil properties, vegetational community, hydrology, and climate to guide land management. Ecological Site Descriptions associated with fragipan bearing soils are necessary, especially when making land management decisions.
Highlights
Soils with fragipans impose unique influences on landscape hydrology and plant growth
The use of gravel as an indicator of parent material differences and its correlation with fragipan development is not perfectly aligned, most fragipans do exhibit a bisequal soil profile, the placement of the lithologic discontinuity is difficult given mass wasting, eluviation-illuviation, side slopes, and other soil processes that contribute to increasing the bulk density and conferring strength
Ecological Site Descriptions associated with fragipan bearing soils are necessary, especially when making land management decisions
Summary
Soils with fragipans impose unique influences on landscape hydrology and plant growth. Integral to the usage of Ecological Site Descriptions is a model showing the primary vegetational state and transitional factors responsible for land usage and/or disturbed vegetational states. The objectives of this manuscript are: 1) to describe the general soil description of a typical fragipan-bearing soil in the State of Missouri, 2) to provide an understanding of the research status of fragipans, and 3) to estimate the future research needs to understand fragipan genesis, fate, and influence on ecosystem services. The Salem Plateau’s typical mean annual temperatures range from 13 ̊C to 16 ̊C (56 ̊F in the northern portion and 60 ̊F in the southern portion). The Peoria loess was documented to have 1) commonly a silt loam texture, 2) a clay mineralogy largely composed of kaolinite, hydrous mica (illite), vermiculite (hydroxy-Al interlayered vermiculite) and smectite, and 3) evidence of post aeolian deposition of reworking and solifluction (21,000 - 16,500 14C years before present)
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