1.00 Credits
Soils are complex and dynamic systems. To improve and maintain high soil quality, one must understand how the individual components of soil, from the water that flows through the pores to the elemental composition of the soil particles, change over time under different conditions. This course focuses on developing knowledge of the physical, chemical, and biological measurements of soil, the techniques that are employed, and how the results aid in soil regeneration and identifying healthy soil. Understanding soil sampling schema is also an integral part of this course as analyses would be meaningless without knowing how to obtain a sample that is representative of a given space. This course is intended as a theoretical introduction to soil analysis in the context of agriculture and is supported by application of soil science in 6 semesters of Regenerative Field Lab (ENV 200) for majors in the Environmental Science Regenerative Agriculture track. Students in other majors may take the course as a brief, stand alone introduction to the concepts of soil analysis.