Reference soil South Africa 18: Luvisol

ZA018

Luvisols occur mainly in temperate regions, particularly in areas with a Mediterranean-type of climate.

Characteristics

Soils having an argic horizon (a subsurface horizon with a distinct higher clay content than the overlying horizon) with a cation exchange capacity equal to or more than 24 cmolc per kg clay throughout.

Distribution of Luvisols (rough estimation supplied by soilgrids)

Reference soil ZA018: Luvisol

Classification

WRB 2014

Luvisol

Physical characteristics

Particle size distribution

Depth (cm)	Gravel % v/v	very coarse sand % w/w	coarse sand % w/w	medium sand % w/w	fine sand % w/w	very fine sand % w/w	Total sand % w/w	coarse silt % w/w	fine silt % w/w	Total silt % w/w	Clay % w/w
0-15	14	8	5.1	3	3	1	21.8	10	23	33	44.8
15-30	19	8.2	5	3.9	3.7	1.5	22.3	10.8	28	38.8	39
30-60	27	12.2	6.8	5.3	4.6	1.7	30.6	10.9	23.5	34.4	34.9
60-80	-	6.4	3.6	1.2	0.9	0.3	12.4	3.4	15.5	18.9	68.8
80-90	-	1.6	1.4	0.5	0.5	0.2	4.2	3.1	26.2	29.3	66.5

Water retention characteristics

Depth (cm)	Bulk density kg/dm³	Spec. Surf. Area m²/g	COLE cm/cm	Water disp. clay %	Clay % w/w
0-15	-	-	-	-	44.8
15-30	-	-	-	-	39
30-60	-	-	-	-	34.9
60-80	-	-	-	-	68.8
80-90	-	-	-	-	66.5

Chemical data

Depth (cm)	pH H2O	pHKCl	EC 1: 2.5 dS/m	CaCO3 % w/w	C % w/w	N %	C / N	Exch. Acid cmol(c)/kg	Exch. Al cmol(c)/kg	Ca cmol(c)/kg	Mg cmol(c)/kg	K cmol(c)/kg	Na cmol(c)/kg	Sum Cations cmol(c)/kg
0-15	5.7	4.6	0.17	-	2.34	0.23	10	-	0	6.0	8.1	0.5	0.4	15
15-30	5.8	4.8	0.19	-	2.77	0.28	10	-	0	7.3	6.5	0.6	0.9	15.3
30-60	5.9	4.7	0.12	-	2.18	0.16	14	-	0	5.0	5.2	0.3	0.4	10.9
60-80	5.6	4.0	0.33	-	1.48	0.24	6	-	0.9	2.6	10.5	0.2	1.7	15
80-90	5.3	3.7	0.37	-	0.66	0.25	3	-	2.8	2.0	10.1	0.2	2.1	14.4

Depth (cm)	Base sat. %	CEC soil cmol(c)/kg	CEC clay cmol(c)/kg	CEC org cmol(c)/kg	ECEC cmol(c)/kg	Al sat. %	ESP %
0-15	62	24.3	54	8.2	-	0	-
15-30	45	33.9	87	9.7	-	0	-
30-60	54	20.2	58	7.6	-	0	-
60-80	53	28.2	41	5.2	-	3	-
80-90	60	23.9	36	2.3	-	12	-

Depth (cm)	pH NaF	P Retention %	ODOE	Al o % w/w	Si o % w/w	Fe d % w/w	Al d % w/w	Fe p % w/w	Al p % w/w	C p % w/w	Fe o % w/w
0-15	-	-	-	-	-	4.6	0.3	-	-	-	-
15-30	-	-	-	-	-	4.5	0.3	-	-	-	-
30-60	-	-	-	-	-	5.7	0.3	-	-	-	-
60-80	-	-	-	-	-	4.8	0.3	-	-	-	-
80-90	-	-	-	-	-	3.3	0.3	-	-	-	-

Elemental composition of the clay

Depth (cm)	SiO2 % w/w	Al2O3 % w/w	Fe2O3 % w/w	CaO % w/w	MgO % w/w	K2O % w/w	Na2O % w/w	TiO2 % w/w
0-15	49.3	28.2	10	0.09	0.72	2.64	-	1.27
15-30	47.9	28.1	10.5	0.07	0.62	2.39	-	1.34
30-60	50.9	16.5	10.3	0.02	0.62	2.31	-	1.62
60-80	48	29.8	9.9	0.06	0.77	2.84	-	0.95
80-90	53.1	27.6	7.4	0	0.88	3.57	-	0.81
90-	59.8	26.1	3.3	0	0.79	3.86	-	0.78

Depth (cm)	MnO2 % w/w	P2O5 % w/w	Ign.Loss clay % w/w	Total Clay % w/w	SiO2/Al2O3 mol/mol	SiO2/Fe2O3 mol/mol	SiO2 / R mol/mol	Al2O3/Fe2O3 mol/mol
0-15	0.23	0.34	9	101.8	3	13	2.4	4.4
15-30	0.24	0.42	9.2	100.8	2.9	12.1	2.3	4.2
30-60	0.16	0.33	8.8	101.5	3.3	13.2	2.6	4
60-80	0.09	0.23	8.8	101.4	2.7	12.8	2.3	4.7
80-90	0.01	0.12	7.5	101	3.3	19	2.8	5.8
90-	0.01	0.15	6.7	101.5	3.9	18.1	3.6	12.4

Elemental composition of the soil

Depth (cm)	Al2O3 % w/w	CaO % w/w	Fe2O3 % w/w	K2O % w/w	MgO % w/w	Na2O % w/w	SiO2 % w/w	TiO2 % w/w
0-15	15.9	0.37	12.9	1.73	0.54	-	53.1	1.11
15-30	15.1	0.34	13.8	1.58	0.48	-	53.9	1.16
30-60	13.2	0.23	19.5	1.35	0.4	-	51.5	1.18
60-80	22.6	0.35	12.6	2.38	0.79	-	45.5	0.87
80-90	21.4	0.04	7.5	2.99	0.86	-	46.1	0.86
90-	20.9	0.02	2.6	3.51	0.79	-	63.7	0.85

Depth (cm)	Al2O3/Fe2O3 mol/mol	LOI % w/w	MnO2 % w/w	P2O5 % w/w	SiO2 / Al2O3 mol/mol	SiO2/Fe2O3 mol/mol	SiO2 / R mol/mol
0-15	1.9	14.2	0.30	0.32	5.7	11.0	3.7
15-30	1.7	14.8	0.35	0.32	6.1	10.4	3.8
30-60	1.1	13.0	0.22	0.37	6.6	7.0	3.4
60-80	2.8	15.0	0.10	0.39	3.4	9.6	2.5
80-90	4.5	11.0	0.01	0.06	3.7	16.4	3.0
90-	12.6	7.9	0.01	0.03	5.2	65.2	4.8

Clay mineralogy

Depth (cm)	Chlorite	Feldspar	Gibbsite	Goethite	Halloysite	Hematite	Kaolinite	Mica / illite	Mixed-layer	Quartz	Smec	Vermiculite
0-15	-	-	-	very weak to weak	-	-	weak to medium	-	strong	very weak to weak	-	-
15-30	-	-	-	very weak to weak	-	-	weak to medium	-	strong	very weak to weak	-	-
30-60	-	-	-	very weak to weak	-	-	weak to medium	-	strong	weak to medium	-	-
60-80	-	-	-	-	-	-	weak to medium	very weak to weak	strong	weak to medium	-	-
80-90	-	-	-	very weak to weak	-	-	weak to medium	weak to medium	strong	weak to medium	-	-
90-	-	-	-	-	-	-	weak to medium	strong	very weak to weak	strong	-	-

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Reference soil South Africa 18: Luvisol

Characteristics

Reference soil ZA018: Luvisol

Classification