This factsheet describes soil structure, the factors that influence it, and provides suggested practices to improve it in agricultural soils. Soil structure refers to the way that soil particles are arranged into larger units called aggregates. A well-structured soil contains plenty of aggregates and pore spaces both within and between aggregates; this provides favourable conditions […]
The soil surface is the interface between the soil and the atmosphere. Its quality – roughness, porosity, stability – determines the rates of exchange of water and gases. Visual assessment of soil surface quality (SSQ) can give an indication of soil health and soil function. A soil surface that has plenty of residue cover, presence […]
Soil structure is a key indicator of soil health. The Visual Evaluation of Soil Structure (VESS) provides a simple framework for quantitatively scoring soil structure quality. It requires only a shovel for extracting a block of soil and a scoring sheet for evaluating it and can be performed in about 10 minutes with a little […]