Brown Earth - General Relations in Western Europe

General Relations in Western Europe

Brown Earths are important, because they are permeable and usually easy to work throughout the year, so they are valued for agriculture. They also support a much wider range of forest trees than can be found on wetter land. They are freely drained soils with well-developed A and B horizons. They often develop over relatively permeable bedrock of some kind, but are also found over unconsolidated parent materials like river gravels. Some soil classifications include well-drained alluvial soils in the brown earths too.

Typically the Brown Earths have dark brown topsoils with loamy particle size-classes and good structure – especially under grassland. The B horizon lacks the grey colours and mottles characteristic of gley soils. The rich colour is the result of iron compounds, mainly complex oxides which, like rust, have a reddish-brown colour. Some of these soils are, in fact, red. For example, in the UK reddish brown earths occur on the Old Red Sandstone (Devonian) and the New Red Sandstone (Permian), and are red because the rocks from which they formed are derived from strongly oxidised deposits that were laid down under desert conditions millions of years ago.

In long-cultivated soils the pH in the topsoil tends to be higher (more alkaline) than in the subsoil as a result of the addition of lime over the years. In general, the wetter the climate, the more acidic the soils. This is because rain tends to wash the “alkaline” bases out of the soil. Of course, the parent material also has an effect, and hard acidic rocks give rise to more acidic soils than do the softer sandstones. The landscapes where these lowland soils occur are typically undulating, and interesting variations in the profiles relate to the slopes where they are found. We think, perhaps of soils as static and unchanging, but in fact they are never stationary. The processes of weathering and plant growth that were responsible for the formation of soils from bare parent materials in the first place are still going on. This is most easily seen on a hill slope. The top of the hill is usually convex, and it is here that most erosion is taking place – upper slopes and summits are more exposed to wind, and rain, and gravity is slowly but surely moving the topsoil down the hill. Thus soils on the brow of the hill tend to be shallower than those in mid-slope positions, where soil is moving down, but being replaced by material from above. At the base of the slope we usually find a concave area where the eroded soil has accumulated. Here the topsoils will be significantly thicker than elsewhere.