1. Suppose you work for a government office that needs to find a suitable place to bury barrels of poisonous liquid wastes. The soils that are used to bury the waste should have properties that will prevent the liquid from moving quickly down toward the groundwater—just in case the barrels begin to leak at some point. You should look for a soil with which type of texture?
Select one:
a. Sandy
b. Silty
c. Clay Rich
d. Loam 2. A sample of soil from a C horizon is light brown in color and has a high content of a mineral called feldspar. Which of the following statements is most likely true?
Select one:
a. The soil in the O horizon is also light brown.
b. The parent material rock had feldspar minerals in it.
c. The C horizon is very deep.
d. The soil in O, A, and B horizons supplied feldspar to the lower C horizon. 3. The bacteria found in soil is usually harmful and measures are taken to remove any traces of microorganisms.
Select one:
True
False
4. Which of the following best defines soil texture?
Select one:
a. Amount of nutrients in the soil
b. Depth of the soil
c. A measure of how developed a soil is
d. The relative amounts of sand, silt and clay particles
5. Which of the following actions or events did not contribute to the Dust Bowl?
Select one:
a. Farmers in the Central U.S. had plowed grasslands to grow food crops to feed the increasing human population.
b. They left the fields plowed and bare in the winter months when crops were not grown, and this left the soil exposed to wind.
c. A long drought in the 1930s left the exposed soil especially dry due to the lack of precipitation.
d. With the advent of pesticides, minerals in the ground were leached.
6. Why is a rain drop a particularly damaging element to soil?
Select one:
a. It dilutes minerals in the soil.
b. It causes the soil to break apart and carries it away.
c. It often contains contaminants that poison the soil.
d. It prevents the aeration of the soil. 7. Due to a recent drought, a farmer has lost quite a bit of soil on his fields because:
Select one:
a. the rain has washed it away.
b. the animals have been trying to eat the soil due to lack of food.
c. wind has carried away the dry soil.
d. the plants have absorbed the soil.
8. A farmer fields, which are close to a stream, has experienced a lot of runoff. One possible effect of the runoff is that the stream will have a decreased level of fertilizers from the field.
Select one:
True
False