Solum
The earth's surface is a rugged terrain with an amplitude of some 19 km.
About 70% is covered by water, the rest by land. This land predominatly consists
of hardrock in various forms. At its surface water, air and bio-organisms
are in direct contact with the rock. This contact results in chemical and physical
reactions both resulting in the breakdown of the rockmass. This weathered rock
is called soil. Thet toplayer, consisting of the A and B-horizont, is called
"true soil" or solum in latin. It varies in thickness depending on age and physical features
such as climate, relief and position. Disintegration of all sorts has always fascinated me
and inspired me into writing several papers.
My master thesis concerned the revegetation of scars caused by landslides.
Slopes with clayey soils in combination with eratic rainfall are vulnarable
to land slides and mass movements in general. The vegetation on these hills
is often damaged or removed altogether. This paper tries to describe and
quantify the velocity with which this vegetation recuperates.
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The hilly southeastern section of the Netherlands has the potential for
severe soil erosion. This paper describes the actual erosion or rather the
potential erosion risk in Southern Limburg. The risk is based on a DTM (Digital
Terrain Model) in combination with a landuse map (LGN 4).
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Detecting soil erosion can be done in many ways. Airborne Laser Scanning
is one tool in the determination of the geographical spread and magnitude
of erosion and mass movement events.
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The soils in the Medditeranean are often thought to be suspectible to
degeneration. This paper links the state and use of soils in the Herault
Catchment in southern France. It is the report of a casestudy done for the
Soil Conservation and Protection in Europe (SCAPE).
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