SOILS OF THE EASTERN UNITED STATES AND THEIR USE XXVIII. 



THE SUSQUEHANNA FINE SANDY LOAM. 



GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 



An area of 1,686, 528 acres of the Susquehanna fine sandy loam has 

 been encountered in 27 different soil survey areas located in five differ- 

 ent States. This soil is practically confined to the timbered region 

 of the Gulf Coastal Plain. Small areas are found in southwestern 

 Georgia. Larger areas occur in central Alabama, and the type is 

 developed to a limited extent in eastern Mississippi. It is west of the 

 Mississippi River in northern Louisiana and in the timbered portion 

 of eastern Texas that the widest development of the Susquehanna 

 fine sandy loam occurs and throughout this region it is a dominant 

 soil in many of the counties. 



CHARACTERISTICS OF SOIL AND SUBSOIL. 



The surface soil of the Susquehanna fine sandy loam is a gray or 

 brown fine sand or fine sandy loam, having an average depth of about 

 12 inches. This material rests upon a stiff clay subsoil which is 

 prevalently red or yellowish red in color, becoming almost universally 

 mottled and variegated with red, yellow, gray, or drab at greater 

 depths. Boundaries between the soil and subsoil are usually sharply 

 defined. Frequently the surface soil contains considerable amounts 

 of iron concretions and of plates and fragments of iron-cemented 

 sand. Occasionally a small amount of fine quartz gravel is also 

 present. 



The Susquehanna fine sandy loam most closely resembles the 

 Orangeburg fine sandy loam in its general coloration and texture, but 

 is readily distinguished from that type by its stiff plastic clay sub- 

 soil as distinct from the red sandy clay subsoil of the Orangeburg 

 types. 



SURFACE FEATURES AND DRAINAGE. 



Tn all of the more eastern areas of its occurrence the surface of the 

 Susquehanna fine sandy loam is rather sharply rolling to hilly and 

 broken. In fact it is prevalently a timbered, hill soil. In many in- 

 stiinces the slopes are so steep and the surface of the type so broken 



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18596 Cir. 5112 



