Soil taxonomy (USDA Soil Taxonomy)

• This system was officially adopted in the USA in 1965 and because of its worldwide application may countries have also adopted the system.
• The characteristics of this type of classification is given below:

a. The system is based on soil properties that are easily verified by others. This lessens the likelihood of controversy over the classification of a given soil, which can occur when scientists deal with systems based on soil genesis.

o It permits classification of soils rather than soil-forming processes.

o It focuses on the soil rather than related sciences such as geology and climatology.

o It permits the classification of soils of unknown genesis-only the knowledge of their soil properties is needed.

b. It uses unique nomenclature system which gives a definite connotation of the major characteristic of the soil in question.

o It permits greater uniformity of classification as applied by a large number of soil scientists. Differences in interpretation of how a soil was formed do not influence its classification under this scheme.