Formation and Evolution of Land Use Toward an Initial Synthesis of Selected Elements and Its Distribution in Soils of Eastern Guilan Province of Iran

The mass balance approach provides a valuable platform to model soil and link pedology to other modern earth science disciplines. The hypothesis of mass conservation within soil profile is base on the evolution of vertical distribution of chemical elements as traces of alternation phenomena. In order to assess these phenomena, the soils of two different parent rock material of basalt and phylite under three land uses of tea, citrus and forest were selected for this study. The studied area was located in Eastern Guilan province of Iran. Soil samples of different profile depths were collected and total major elemental content of Si, Al, Fe, Mg, Ca, Na, K, P, Mn and Ti were determined by XRF- method. Soil genesis development of representative residual pedons were studied for each parent material and each land uses. The result showed different elements exhibited very different concentration patterns in a given pedon. The total contents of Si and Al were highest in soils derived from Phylite parent rock and the total content of other measured elements such as Fe, Mn, Si, Al, Na and P were highest in soils derived from basalt parent rock. Physical and chemical data from two different soil pedons and under three different land uses indicated that the entire regolith profile A through C horizons is formed by pedogenic processes of elemental inputs, transformation, translocation and removals.