The Soils of Brant County - Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada

that in Brant County, the series is a category of paramountimportance because it is used for defining and classifying soilswhich are the components of soil map units displayed onthe soil map.Soil PhasesThe soil phase is used to differentiate certain characteristicsof soil series which are significant to plantgrowth, or useofthe soil or land . Only one kind of soil phase has been recognized in Brant County which is the coarse texture phase. It iscommonly associated with soils of the Burford, Guelph andFox soil series. A coarse phase of the Burford soil is designatedas BUF.C .Miscellaneous LandUnitsThereare some land areas too variable or complex in termsof soil or slope conditions to classify and map in the conventionalway as soil map units . These are recognized as Miscellaneous Land Units and include recent floodplains adjacent tomajor rivers and streams, e .g . ALU and steep escarpmentsoften associated with entrenched or eroded stream valleys, e .g.ESC . Marsh (MAR) and Urban Land (ULD) MiscellaneousLand Units are also recognized .Soil Map UnitsThe natural landscape is comprised of soils which are portrayedon soil maps by means of soil map units . Usually soilsoccur in a repetitive pattern within a landscape and the soilmap unit describes this pattern in terms of dominant and subdominantsoil components . In some soil landscapes where thesoils are relatively homogeneous, the soil map unit will consistofonly one soil component, e.g . the BRT 1 map unit comprisedof only Brant soils . The usual case is one in which soil mapunits consist ofa dominant soil component, which is estimatedto occupy approximately 70% of the areal extent of the soildelineation, and a subdominant component occupying theremaining 30% of the area . For example, the BRT 4 soil mapunit consists of dominantly Brant soils and subdominant Tuscolasoils, in approximately 70 :30 proportions . Although mapunits are defined with rather precise limits, it should be recognizedthat within anylandscape there is often variability in soilconditions which cannot be described and mapped at the mapscale employed . These seemingly aberrant soils are referred toas soil inclusions, and are generally considered to occupy lessthan 20% of the area of a map delineation .