A Unifying Quantitative Analysis of Soil Texture

Abstract

Abstract The soil texture triangle used by the U.S. Department of Agriculture is converted into a new texture diagram which contains all information in the original triangle, but additionally, gives mean particle size and particle size standard deviation of soil samples. Thus, mechanical analysis information on percents of clay, silt, and sand together with particle‐size limits for clay, silt, and sand are found in a single unified system. The new diagram provides greater resolution in detecting classified soil samples within a texture region, it can be extended to cover coarse fragments, and other soil texture classifications can be incorporated into it.