Soil Catenas, Plymouth
County Massachusetts
The relationships
between soils, landscapes, geology, and parent material
Soil
Catena Diagram, click for larger image.
There are approximately 55 major "types" of soils mapped in Plymouth County. Each "type," or series, is named for the geographical area where it was first described. Each soil series has definite relationships to landscapes, regional geology, and parent materials. Related soils of about the same age, derived from similar parent material and occurring under similar climatic conditions, can be arranged into a sequence of increasing wetness. This sequence is called a soil catena.
Soil Drainage Class |
| Parent Material |
Excessively | Well | Moderately Well |
Poorly | Very Poorly |
| A. Glacial Till (Dense or Basal Till) |
| Unsorted, unstratified, heterogeneous mixture of sand, silt, clay and rock. |
| Loamy dense till - mixed igneous bedrock | Paxton Montauk |
Woodbridge Scituate |
Ridgebury Norwell |
Whitman Brockton |
| Sandy mantle underlain by dense till | Poquonock | Birchwood | Mattapoiset | Brockton |
| Eolian mantle - mixed igneous bedrock | Broadbrook | Rainbow | Whitman Brockton |
Soil Drainage Class |
| Parent Material |
Excessively | Well | Moderately Well |
Poorly | Very Poorly |
| B. Glacial Till (Ablation and/or Ice Contact) |
| Unsorted, unstratified, heterogeneous mixture of sand, silt, clay and rock. |
| Loose sandy till on moraines | Plymouth | Barnstable | Newfields |
| Variable ice contact deposits | Gloucester | Canton | Newfields |
Soil Drainage Class |
| Parent Material |
Excessively | Well | Moderately Well |
Poorly | Very Poorly |
| C. Glacial Fluvial |
| Stratified sand and/or gravel deposited in glacial melt water streams. |
| Sandy fluvial deposits | Carver Windsor |
Merrimac |
Deerfield | Wareham Pipestone Saugatuck |
Scarboro Berryland |
Soil Drainage Class |
| Parent Material |
Excessively | Well | Moderately Well |
Poorly | Very Poorly |
| D. Glacial Lacustrine |
| Silty and clayey sediments deposited in glacial lakes. |
Soil Drainage Class |
| Parent Material |
Excessively | Well | Moderately Well |
Poorly | Very Poorly |
| E. Post Glacial (Holocene) Deposits |
| Holocene underlain by Pleistocene deposits. |
| Alluvial (floodplain) soils | Winooski | Limerick | Saco |
| Organic soils - Tidal | Matunuck Pawcatuck Ipswich |
| Human Altered soils | Udisamment Udorthents |
Udi & Udo wet |
Tihonet | Aquents |
| Coastal eolian soils | Hooksan | Hooksan wet sub. |
