Features of fossil soils

Abstract

Compared with cross-bedded sandstone or coarsely crystalline granite, paleosols at first sight may seem massive and featureless. Despite these nondescript first impressions, paleosols do have distinctive features. For the most part these are characteristics also found in modern soils, yet many paleosols are no longer loose, cracked, and at the land surface. Important differences result from compaction and alteration upon burial which change many of the diagnostic chemical properties of modern soils such as pH, Eh and base saturation. Thus, identification of paleosols can be a problem for both geologists and soil scientists alike.