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Diagnostic Horizons in the Classification System of Russian Soils: Version 2021

  • GENESIS AND GEOGRAPHY OF SOILS
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Abstract

Updating the classification system of Russian soils as a preliminary procedure to the development of its new version is provided by new data, extensive testing of the system in terrain conditions, online and offline discussions, validation in the course of cartographic works, and addressing to the international experience. The first step in updating—analysis of diagnostic horizons as basic elements of the system—comprised scrutinizing the array of horizons, checking their essence, and improving the scheme of their presentation in the system, which is believed to be more convenient and up-to-date. Eleven horizons were moved to a lower category of diagnostic properties. However, it was proposed to enlarge the set of human- modified horizons by introducing the technogenic horizons in addition to the agrogenic horizons, to add a special chernozemic horizon (like chernic horizon in the WRB), and to separate the mesotrophic peat horizon from eutrophic and oligotrophic peat horizons. In the definitions of diagnostic horizons, more strict and formal criteria were formulated along with descriptive characteristics of pedogenesis and the environment. Hence, the volume of definitions of diagnostic horizons increased by approximately three times on the average, while the definitions of diagnostic criteria were preserved intact. Names or symbols were modified for several horizons. As a result, the total number of diagnostic horizons decreased from 51 in the former version-2008 to 47 in the proposed updated version. This paper presents the updated list of horizons and three examples of their revised definitions in the expected updated version. The article provides a proposed general list of diagnostic horizons and 3 examples of new horizon descriptions.

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Notes

  1. In 1998, an international Working Group on Soils in Urban, Industrial, Traffic, Mining, and Military Areas (SUITMA) was organized under the umbrella of Division III (Soil Use and Management) if the International Union of Soil Sciences.

  2. English names for diagnostic horizons and properties were checked by R.W. Arnold when editing the English version of CSR [33].

  3. Dark-cutanic property was proposed by S. Loiko for organic-clay coatings in the mid-profile horizons of soils with textural differentiation.

  4. For successful diagnostics of soil horizons, methods for field description of soils should be refined with due account for taxonomic decisions. Along with routine descriptions of soil morphology, special attention should be paid to the features that serve as diagnostic criteria, e.g., the presence and amount of clay coatings, various other pedofeatures, etc.

  5. In previous versions of the CSR, it was referred to as the mucky–dark-humus horizon.

  6. In previous versions of the CSR, solonetzic horizon of brown color was designated as the BSN horizon and was separated from the dark-colored ASN solonetzic horizon. In the new version, both horizons are designated by the SN symbol. To specify solonetzic horizons with dark humus coatings (ASN), the SNiu symbol is used (solonetzic horizon with dark-humus illuviation coatings). The latter horizon allows us to diagnose the subtype of solonetzes with dark humus coatings (corresponding to chernozemic subtypes of solonetzes in the classification of soils of the Soviet Union (1977)) in the type of solonetzes.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Dokuchaev Soil Science Institute, per. Pyzhevskii 7, 119017, Moscow, Russia

    N. B. Khitrov & M. I. Gerasimova

  2. Faculty of Geography, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Leninskie Gory 1, 119991, Moscow, Russia

    M. I. Gerasimova

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  1. N. B. Khitrov
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Correspondence to N. B. Khitrov.

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Translated by M. Gerasimova

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Khitrov, N.B., Gerasimova, M.I. Diagnostic Horizons in the Classification System of Russian Soils: Version 2021. Eurasian Soil Sc. 54, 1131–1140 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1134/S1064229321080093

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