Soil is one of the common factors that bring all agriculture
together. Regardless of what you farm, the quality of the soil
is important. The terms used most often are soil quality and
soil health. While many use the terms interchangeably, there is
a difference between the two. In The Nature and Properties of
Soils (Brady and Weil) Fourteenth Edition, they describe the
concepts of soil health and soil quality: "Although these terms
are often used synonymously, they involve two distinct concepts.
The soil health refers to self-regulation, stability,
resilience, and lack of stress symptoms in a soil as an
ecosystem. Soil health describes the biological integrity of the
soil community-the balance among organisms within a soil and
between soil organisms and their environment." Soil quality is a
term that we use when we talk about the physical attributes of
soil. Physical attributes can be as basic as color. It can also
be used to describe more complex soil characteristics such as
soil organic matter, nutrient amo