Soil Taxonomy in Romania

Abstract

The Romanian System of Soil Taxonomy (RSST) is a consistent soil classification based on the concept of soil as a natural self-standing entity introduced by V.V. Dokuchaev (and in Romania by G. Murgoci) and modernized taking into account the objective criteria for soil characterization and identification introduced by Guy Smith and American Soil Survey Staff. The RSST is a hierarchical system having the soil (genetic) type as basic reference taxon. The soil types are grouped at the highest level into soil (genetic) classes, equivalent to soil order in U.S. Soil Taxonomy. The soil type and their subdivisions correspond to suborders, great groups and subgroups of soils in U.S. Soil Taxonomy. At lower levels, the genetic and lithological variety of RSST corresponds, to a certain extent, to the family and series of soils in U.S. Soil Taxonomy. The soil nomenclature of RSST, in a great extent traditional and very similar to those of the World Reference Base for Soil Resources, differs considerably from the U.S. Soil Taxonomy terminology, in that it is rationally and logically constructed, and self-significant. In the large scale soil survey of Romania, each soil map unit delineated on the map is also characterized as an environmental soil unit by registering soil and land data in the form of a “fraction,” whereby the soil properties are given as the numerator and the land attributes as the denominator.