LOCATION DELLROSE           TN+AL
Established Series
Rev. CM:RPS
04/2001

DELLROSE SERIES


The Dellrose series consists of very deep, well drained soils that formed in medium textured, cherty colluvium on foot slopes and steep hillsides. These soils have moderately rapid permeability. Slopes range from 2 to 60 percent. Near the type location, mean annual temperature is 58.5 degrees F. and mean annual precipitation is 52.9 inches.

TAXONOMIC CLASS: Fine-loamy, mixed, semiactive, thermic Typic Paleudults

TYPICAL PEDON: Dellrose gravelly silt loam--pasture. (Colors are for moist soils unless otherwise stated.)

Ap--0 to 8 inches; dark brown (7.5YR 3/2) gravelly silt loam; moderate medium granular structure; very friable; many fine roots; 20 percent fragments of chert up to about 3 inches in diameter; moderately acid; clear smooth boundary. (6 to 14 inches thick)

BA--8 to 16 inches; brown (7.5YR 4/4) gravelly silt loam; moderate fine and medium subangular blocky structure; friable; common fine and medium roots; 20 percent chert fragments up to about 3 inches in diameter; moderately acid; gradual wavy boundary. (5 to 20 inches thick)

Bt1--16 to 38 inches; brown (7.5YR 4/4) gravelly silty clay loam; moderate medium and fine subangular blocky structure; friable; common fine and medium roots; 25 percent chert fragments up to about 3 inches in diameter; few faint clay films on some faces of peds and on chert fragments; strongly acid; gradual wavy boundary.

Bt2--38 to 54 inches; strong brown (7.5YR 5/6) gravelly silty clay loam; few fine and medium distinct yellowish brown (10YR 5/4) mottles and common black stains; moderate medium subangular blocky structure; friable; 20 percent chert fragments up to about 3 inches in diameter; few distinct clay films on faces of peds, on chert fragments, and in pores; strongly acid; gradual wavy boundary. (Combined thickness of the Bt horizon is 25 to 50 inches)

2Bt3--54 to 70 inches; yellowish brown (10YR 5/6) clay, common fine and medium distinct mottles of yellowish red (5YR 5/6) and yellowish brown (10YR 5/4); weak medium angular blocky structure; many distinct clay films on faces of peds; very firm; common medium black concretions; few small chert pebbles; strongly acid. (0 to 20 inches thick)

TYPE LOCATION: Dekalb County, Tennessee; in lower part of the hillside near a cut that transects hillside near Hurricane Bridge over Center Hill Lake; 100 yards south of proposed summer play house of Tennessee Technological University.

RANGE IN CHARACTERISTICS: Solum thickness and depth to bedrock is greater than 60 inches. Chert fragments range from 10 to 35 percent in each horizon above the discontinuity except the lower part of the Bt horizon ranges to 50 percent. Fragments range from 0 to 15 percent in the clayey part below the discontinuity. Reaction ranges from moderately acid to very strongly acid except the surface layer is less acid in recently limed areas.

The A or Ap horizon has hue of 10YR or 7.5YR, value of 3 or 4 and chroma of 2 to 4. The fine earth fraction is silt loam or loam.

Most pedons have a transitional horizon between the A and Bt horizons.

The Bt horizon has hue of 10YR or 7.5YR, value of 4 or 5, and chroma of 4 to 8. Some pedons also have subhorizons within the Bt horizon that have hue of 5YR, value of 4, and chroma of 4 to 8. The fine earth fraction is silty clay loam or silt loam.

The 2Bt horizon, where present, has hue of 10YR, 7.5YR or 5YR, value of 4 or 5, and chroma of 4 to 8. Some pedons have mottles in shades of brown, yellow or gray. It is silty clay, clay or silty clay loam.

COMPETING SERIES: Dellrose is the only series in this family. Other series in similar families are the Armour, Harpeth, Humphreys, Porters, Sequatchie, Statler, and Tusquitee series. Armour soils are fine-silty and have base saturation of more than 35 percent. Harpeth soils are fine-silty. Humphreys and Sequatchie soils have siliceous mineralogy. Porters, Statler, and Tusquitee soils are mesic.

GEOGRAPHIC SETTING: Dellrose soils are on foot slopes and hillsides. Slopes are dominantly 12 to 40 percent, but range from 2 to 60 percent. These soils formed in medium textured, cherty colluvium about 4 1/2 to 6 feet thick and the underlying clayey residuum. Near the type location, mean annual temperature is 58.5 degrees F. and mean annual precipitation is 52.9 inches.

GEOGRAPHICALLY ASSOCIATED SOILS: These are the similar Armour series and the Bodine, Hawthorne, and Mimosa series. Bodine and Hawthorne soils have a pale colored A horizon and more than 35 percent chert fragments in the B horizon. Mimosa soils are clayey and have a higher base saturation.

DRAINAGE AND PERMEABILITY: Well drained; medium to rapid runoff; moderately rapid permeability.

USE AND VEGETATION: Most of the acreage is pastured. Small patches of corn, hay, and tobacco are grown. The native vegetation is hardwoods, chiefly beech, hickory, oaks, yellow poplar, hackberry, black walnut, and locust.

DISTRIBUTION AND EXTENT: On slopes leading from Highland Rim Plateau to Central Basin in Tennessee. The series is of large extent.

MLRA SOIL SURVEY REGIONAL OFFICE (MO) RESPONSIBLE: Morgantown, West Virginia

SERIES ESTABLISHED: Lincoln County, Tennessee; 1937.

REMARKS: Diagnostic horizons recognized in this pedon are:
Ochric epipedon - 0 to 8 inches (Ap horizon)
Argillic horizon - 16 to 70 inches (Bt and 2Bt horizons)


National Cooperative Soil Survey
U.S.A.