Tuesday, November 6, 2007 - 2:15 PM
196-4

Soil Geomorphology Working Group Perspectives, Charges, and Goals on Gypsum Occurrence in Landscapes.

Philip Schoeneberger, USDA-NRCS, USDA-NRCS, 100 Centennial Mall N, MS-34, Lincoln, NE 68508 and Lynn Loomis, USDA, PO Box 362, Marfa, TX 79843.

The NCSS-sponsored Soil Geomorphology Working Group on gypsum soils is exploring and documenting the preferential distribution and occurrence of gypsum in landscapes, the dynamics that cause such patterns, and the likely management consequences and utility of such information.  Specific aspets of gypsum distribution in large, semi-arid to arid basins are contrasted to karstic uplands for an area of 250,00 hectares in the southwestern US.  Ephasis is on soil geomorphic and landform relationships between surface forms and underpinning soil / parent materials and the processes that interconnect them.  Concepts developed here are applicable to other gypsum areas.  Major soil types and their morphologies are used to illustrate specific pedogenic processes and geomorphic concepts.