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So I was down at the pond feeding the bream little balls of white bread and timing how many seconds they could sink through the clear water before they were eaten...(" This is William Beebe in the bathysphere, I am descending and am currently at a depth of ...Oh my god! A giant fish ...arrrgh........." ) and it occured to me that a soil profile nonmeme might be something to share.
All it takes is a shovel, and a ruler for scale. If you want to play, give us a look at your soil, say at least 12 inches deep...don't hurt yourself, but go deeper if you want.
This profile is at my shooting range. I will post a closer image sans my profile and avec a ruler next.
FYI: Few of the bread ball bathyspheres descended more than 3 seconds before being eaten.
15 comments:
Dig 12 inches?! We can't even get the tip end of the shovel into the ground most of the time.
I can tell you what's there though: clay, rocks, and more clay and more rocks.
I think we can do this. By "we" I mean the pirate, but of course, that goes without saying! What a great idea. We have a perfect spot where the greenhouse once stood, and a hole that may already by 12 inches. If not, I'm sure it won't take him long to get there.
I just told the pirate of your idea, and he said I could hold the ruler to measure the hole he'll dig! Woohoo, I'm going to help!
Um... don't take this personally... but uh.. that profile of yours kind of reminds me of a skelton! or a ghoul of some sort! digging a grave!!!
lol, i can't help it. look at the teeth!!!
THis could be a real interesting meme. I'll see what I can do in my back yard. It's usually a mixture of soil, then dirt, and then crushed shells.
I can guarantee it won't be as descriptive as yours! If I hit water and a sinkhole erupts, better get some land ready cause we'll be moving up there!
Really, FC! This is easy for you to say! We're still frozen and even thawed, at 3 inches we hit solid clay. I've put 100s of yards of topsoil into raised beds just to have the perennial
beds. (I did have the pleasure of digging my Florida soil a few weeks ago when we planted our citrus trees.)
William Beebe...or Howdy Doody. It's that chin. :-)
Besides- I'm still working on my watershed meme. Tonight's post has a bit of a puzzler for you. But as soon as I finish the watershed bit I'll try playing in the dirt.
First Pogo, now William Beebe, you really are taking me back to my high school days.
I dig, leaves, rock, red clay, rock, bedrock. that's it.
To everyone north of the St.Marys River, ...OOPS! I was being very Floridacentric to think that you could actually dig in your frozen dirt. I forget that even your soil freezes...may God have mercy on your soil.
Rurality,
No dynamite lying around?
RD,
You go girl!
Laura,
Okay, I see some funky hair spikes after a windy day gardening, but the teeth thing...my beard? No offense taken. If you hit water just bottle it, call it VitaminSeaH2O, and make a mint.
Vicki,
See disclaimer about my ignorance of real winter above.
Okay, one thing at a time, finish your watershed homework.
Mac,
William Beebe was a hero of mine as ocean crazy kid. He was one brave scientist.
I remember a great pic of the bathysphere (?) after being hauled up when it had a leak - the water was streaming, if that's the word, out like a steel rod.
Soil profile - great idea! I'll play. Unfortunately I suspect I'll find no fossils, Eocene or otherwise :-(
BTW, a further challenge - take the soil and put it in a pot and water it. See what's in the seed bank 12" down.
Wayne,
I remember that very same photo.
I like the subsoil planting idea...will do. I'll reshave the profile to make sure no surface seed contamination occurred.
I forgot to mention, there is a shadow in the middle that appears to be a snake looking at you. See the eye bulges on top of his head? His forked tongue sticking out? OK maybe he's a cartoon snake. But still.
Also, I made these round fizzing "bath bomb" things for a craft show one year. I called them bathyspheres, but nobody thought that was funny except me...
Rurality,
I see it...it's one of those Nikon snakes.
Bathtub bombs sound pretty exciting. You could have called them Beebe bubblers.
They wouldn't have got that either.
Yup, we are many miles north of pretty much anybody who doesn't hail from Canada. Many weeks, and indeed a couple of moons, before we will be shoveling anything but snow. Sigh
This is a really neat idea though and I can't wait until I can play too.
Threecollie,
I should have thought of frozen soil...duh! I am such a Floridiot sometimes.
In spite of being in Ontario, I have a suspicion that I may be able to dig as we had so much warm weather in January that the ground was not frozen. Mind you it has been below freezing for a few days but I know of a couple of places where the ground felt soft below my boot yesterday. I'm going to get out the shovel and try. I'll let you know later.
Ontario,
Good for you! I need to drop in on your blog anyway! Thanks!
This looks like fun!
I did a similar study in my garden-plot-to-be, to determine if I had sand, clay, or loam. I read about it in a gardening book. I'll "dig up" the book (ha) and make a post in my blog about it.
When we dig our foot down and photograph it (sans shadow and avec measuring tape) what do we do? Add a comment to this entry pointing back to our own blogs and our study?
I'm one of those people that has to read ALL the rules inside the game box lid before I'll agree to play.
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