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CRYSTAL PIT <br />Soil to plant relationships are extremely strong on this site. <br />• The nature of the soil is very strongly related to the vegetation <br />composition. The parent material (the material to be mined for road <br />gravel) is decomposed Pikes Peak granite and is very uniform. Thus, <br />any changes in the nature of the soil would probably not be related to <br />changes in parent material as is so often found in the sedimentary <br />soils near Colorado Springs. Here, changes in the soil are largely <br />controlled by the factors which control the composition and density of <br />the vegetation. Thus, aspect, slope, and moisture gradients, and <br />interactive soil development processes largely control both the soil <br />and vegetation to produce a highly integrated system of mutual <br />development resulting in highly distinctive vegetation and soil units <br />which can change dramatically in a matter of a few feet. Yet all the <br />various soils are derived from the same parent material. This pattern <br />indicates that stability in the vegetation is dependent upon <br />successional processes which influence soil development. This would <br />result in a developmental process consistent with the application of <br />non-linear growth equations. In the long term, this would produce a <br />plateau sequence of development similar in function to the systems <br />found on oceanic islands. This is in contrast to the more linear <br />patterns found in areas where soil largely controls vegetation rather <br />than the vegetation and soil developing together as an integrated unit <br />as appears to have very strongly occurred here. <br />SOILS INFDRMATIDN <br />Soils on this site are quite variable depending upon the <br />vegetation present on the location of interest. On the drier, more <br />southerly facing hillsides the soil ranges from about 2 or 3 inches of <br />a gravelly, sandy loam to essentially no soil. The latter is the most <br />common condition. All soils on these hillsides are of very poor <br />quality and barely distinguishable from the decomposed granite <br />underlying the soil and forming the parent material. It is unlikely <br />much soil could be salvaged from these hillsides for use in <br />reclamation, but wherever a distinguishable soil is found it will be <br />• saved for the reclamation. <br />7 <br />