Spatial arrangement of soil mantle in Glacis de Buenavista, Mexico as a product and record of landscape evolution

Use of soils and palaeosols on volcanic materials to establish the duration of soil formation at different chronological scales

“…Although Díaz-Ortega et al (2011) recognized these soils as Luvisols (due to the lack of the analytical results required for a correct classification), they can be regarded as Acrisols. Their weathering indexes, such as the base/alumina ratio, reveal the strong leaching which affect the soils (Escamilla et al, 2002).…”

“…The Fed and Feo contents, as well as the Feo/Fed ratio are higher than in Mexicapa (Table 4). In both profiles, the content of allophane is less than 1%, no volcanic glass is detected, and the crystalline clay minerals are dominated by kaolinite (Díaz-Ortega et al, 2011).…”

“…The palaeosols of the four sites have been studied and the results have published (Sedov et al, 2001(Sedov et al, , 2003a(Sedov et al, , 2003b(Sedov et al, , 2009Solleiro-Rebolledo et al, 2007;Díaz-Ortega et al, 2011). In this work, we consider selected information which can be related to the weathering status and soil evolutionary trends: macro-and micromorphology, total organic carbon (TOC), clay content, Alo, Sio, Feo (aluminum, silicon, and iron extracted with acid oxalate), Fed (iron extracted with dithionite-citrate-bicarbonate), clay mineralogy, and amorphous minerals content evaluated by using the formula of Parfitt and Wilson (1985).…”

“…The mean annual temperature at altitudes of 2400 masl is 12.1 C and the annual rainfall is 1510 mm (García, 1988), while at lower positions temperature is higher (20.7 C) and precipitation lower (1150 mm). As a result of different climatic zones, the soil cover is also diverse (Díaz-Ortega et al, 2011), varying from Luvisols in the north to Vertisols in the south. To investigate evidence of fast pedogenesis in the TMBV we choose two polygenetic Luvisols, very clay and weathered, that formed in less than 15,000 y.…”

“…Bt horizons require more than 10,000 years in the semiarid climates of the Canary Islands (Jahn and Stahr, 1996) as well as in the tropical humid climates of the Tonga islands (Gracheva et al, 2001). However, the formation of a Bt horizon can be faster if the parent material has clay originally (Birkeland, 1999;Díaz-Ortega et al, 2011). In Mexico, the classic study of the chronosequences in the volcanic areas of the Sierra Nevada by Miehlich (1991) demonstrates the progressive development of Andosols during the Holocene.…”