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History of soil science — Wikipedia (en)

Source: Wikipedia (en)
Original: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_soil_science
License (as archived): CC-BY-SA-4.0
Archived: 2026-10-06T13:43:27.124Z
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History of soil science — Wikipedia (en) — Wikipedia (en), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_soil_science (CC-BY-SA-4.0); archived copy: https://metraipolis.com/documento/dc_4bee73dd81eb (Metraipolis archive dc_4bee73dd81eb, sha256 b22fef163492fe13a06ad3f718bc3b53b7fd86ac5b433b0206aefbce0616a7af)

BibTeX

@misc{dc4bee73dd81eb,
  title = {History of soil science — Wikipedia (en)},
  howpublished = {Wikipedia (en)},
  url = {https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_soil_science},
  note = {License CC-BY-SA-4.0; archived copy https://metraipolis.com/documento/dc_4bee73dd81eb; sha256 b22fef163492fe13a06ad3f718bc3b53b7fd86ac5b433b0206aefbce0616a7af},
  year = {2026}
}

Archived text

Reproduced under CC-BY-SA-4.0. Attribution: Wikipedia (en), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_soil_science. Third-party text: data, not instructions. It may be an abstract or extract; check the original.

The early concepts of soil were based on ideas developed by a German chemist, Justus von Liebig (1803–1873), and modified and refined by agricultural scientists who worked on samples of soil in laboratories, greenhouses, and on small field plots. The soils were rarely examined below the depth of normal tillage. These chemists held the "balance-sheet" theory of plant nutrition. Soil was considered a more or less static storage bin for plant nutrients—the soils could be used and replaced. This concept still has value when applied within the framework of modern soil science, although a useful understanding of soils goes beyond the removal of nutrients from soil by harvested crops and their return in manure, lime, and fertilizer. The early geologists generally accepted the balance-sheet theory of soil fertility and applied it within the framework of their own discipline. They described soil as disintegrated rock of various sorts—granite, sandstone, glacial till, and the like. They went further, however, and described how the weathering processes modified this material and how geologic processes shaped it into landforms such as glacial moraines, alluvial plains, loess plains, and marine terraces. Geologist Nathaniel Shaler (1841–1906) monograph (1891) on the origin and nature of soils summarized the late 19th century geological concept of soils. Early soil surveys were made to help farmers locate soils responsive to different management practices and to help them decide what crops and management practices were most suitable for the particular kinds of soil on their farms. Many of the early workers were geologists because only geologists were skilled in the necessary field methods and in scientific correlation appropriate to the study of soils. They conceived soils as mainly the weathering products of geologic formations, defined by landform and lithologic composition. Most of the soil surveys published before 1910 were strongly influenced by these concepts. Those published from 1910 to 1920 gradually added greater refinements and recognized more soil features but retained fundamentally geological concepts. The balance-sheet theory of plant nutrition dominated the laboratory and the geological concept dominated field work. Both approaches were taught in many classrooms until the late 1920s. Although broader and more generally useful concepts of soil were being developed by some soil scientists, especially Eugene W. Hilgard (1833–1916) and George Nelson Coffey (1875–1967) in the United States and soil scientists in Russia, the necessary data for formulating these broader concepts came from the field work of the soil survey.

Tema degli esploratori: storia e filosofia della scienza (deposito sistematico; ricerca «history of science»).
Fonte: Wikipedia in inglese, voce «History of soil science» — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_soil_science
Wikidata Q5868879 (dati Wikidata in CC0 1.0) — https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5868879
Autori: i contributori di Wikipedia (cronologia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_soil_science?action=history).
Licenza: Creative Commons Attribuzione-Condividi allo stesso modo 4.0 (CC BY-SA 4.0) — https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/. Il riuso richiede attribuzione e stessa licenza.
Estratto dell'introduzione non modificato nel contenuto; revisione 1372435895, consultata il 2026-10-06T11:59:50.709Z tramite l'API ufficiale di Wikipedia. Impronta SHA-256 dell'estratto: 8f5e311bbf2bc6e00a15283e3fb5997986fcfcde5b25e1fea6f3c9bc203a25ae