Links Among Soil Forming Factors, Land Management and Soil Health: A Case Study and Demonstration for Use in the Classroom and Field.

Currently, institutions of higher education have prioritized cross-disciplinary training and experiential learning. These concepts are at the core of the land grant mission for both teaching and outreach. Yet, few courses provide undergraduate students the specific training and materials to prepare them for careers that require cross training and applied research such as extension. This demonstration used in an undergraduate Soil Ecology course and for outreach in soil health builds upon and integrates basic principles of crop and soil sciences presented in prerequisite courses. Such information includes the soil forming factors that create a catena, a sequence of soil series occurring on a slope where parent material and climate are uniform. The material presented introduces the concept of soil health and is followed by a demonstration during which indicators of soil health are used to assess inherent soil properties associated with soil forming factors and dynamic soil properties that are dependent upon land management. Students and other participants are asked to assess the soil health of field sites using a suite of biological, chemical, and physical indicators obtained during the demonstration. Participants then complete side-by-side comparisons of the different soil series of the catena; compare problem areas in a field to non-problem areas; and determine the impact of >10 yr of land management on each soil series within the catena. The impact of such demonstrations is to illustrate to students and the public the value of land grant training and its potential benefit to growers and the public at large.