Gleysolic - Soils of Saskatchewan

Gleysolic

Gleysolic soils are associated with prolonged water saturation of the soil profile. Most commonly this saturation occurs due to concentration of surface water flows into topographic low points (“sloughs”) in a field. Gleysolic soils are commonly found in sloughs wherever the land is rolling or hummocky; the remainder of the landscape is commonly dominated by Chernozemic soils in grasslands or Luvisolic soils in forested areas. Water saturation leads to depletion of oxygen in the soil and soil features associated with oxygen-depleted (or anaerobic) conditions: blue-gray colours in the mass of the soil and reddish zones (called mottles) interspersed in the soil mass. These features are collectively referred to as gley features, and the diagnostic criteria for Gleysolic soils in the presence of well-developed gley features within 50 cm of the soil surface. In the Boreal forest, the mineral Gleysolic soils are often overlain by layer of peat. If the peat is less than 60-cm thick (if fibrous) or 40-cm thick (if more decomposed) the Gleysolic soils can be referred to as Peaty Phase Gleysols. If the peat deposits are thicker than these limits they soils are classified into the Organic Order.

Great Groups of the Gleysolic Order

The three Great Groups of the Gleysolic order all have well-developed gley features within 50 cm of the soils surface. They differ based on the presence of a B horizon enriched in clay (Btg horizon, Luvic Gleysols), an Ah horizon (Humic Gleysols), or an absence of both of these features (Gleysol).

Luvic Gleysolic Soils:

Soils of this great group have a Btg horizon and often have an eluvial Aeg horizon overlying the clay-enriched horizon. They are very common in sloughs that hold water for part of the year throughout Southern Saskatchewan.

Humic Gleysolic Soils

These soils have an organically enriched A horizon (Ah) greater than 10 cm thick or a ploughed A horizon (Ap) greater than 15-cm thick, and have a least 3.5% organic matter in the surface horizon. In cultivated landscapes the Ah or Ap often includes topsoil that has been eroded from elsewhere in the field and deposited in the depressions.

Gleysolic Soils

These soils lack either a Btg or an Ah horizon. In some cases these soils develop in pond sediments created by the organisms that live in the ponds (biogenic sediments).