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Grass roots are “fibrous” near the soil surface and easily decompose, adding organic matter. Taproots open pathways through dense layers. Micro-organisms affect chemical exchanges between roots and soil. Humans can mix the soil so extensively that the soil material is again considered parent material.
Soils are complex mixtures of minerals, water, air, organic matter, and countless organisms that are the decaying remains of once-living things. It forms at the surface of land – it is the “skin of the earth.” Soil is capable of supporting plant life and is vital to life on earth.
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Soil organic matter holds 10 to 1,000 times more water and nutrients than the same amount of soil minerals. Beneficial soil organisms become more numerous and active with diverse crop rotations and higher organic matter levels.
Soil organic matter is the key to building and maintaining healthy soils because it has such great positive influences on essentially all soil properties—aggregation, nutrient availability, soil tilth and water availability, biological diversity and so on— helping to grow healthier plants.
Soil organic matter (SOM) is the organic matter component of soil, consisting of plant and animal detritus at various stages of decomposition, cells and tissues of soil microbes, and substances that soil microbes synthesize.
- CO 2, CO 32−, HCO 3−, CH 4, C
- H 2 PO 4−, HPO 42−
- NH 4+, NO 2−, NO 3−, N 2 (gas), N 2 O (gas)
- S, H 2 S, SO 32−, SO 42−, CS 2
Histosols are mainly composed of organic material in their upper portion. The Histosol order mostly contains soils commonly called bogs, moors, peatlands, muskegs, fens, or peats and mucks. These soils form when organic matter, such as leaves, mosses, or grasses, decomposes more slowly than it accumulates due to a decrease in microbial decay rates.
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Soil organic matter is the fraction of the soil that consists of plant or animal tissue in various stages of breakdown (decomposition). Most of our productive agricultural soils have between 3 and 6% organic matter. Soil organic matter contributes to soil productivity in many different ways.
