How would soil permeability affect water absorption in sol types?

Question

My homework question is:
Explain how soil permeability would affect water absorption in these soil types: gravel, sand, silt, and clay?

Permeability is the ability of a soil or sediment to allow water to flow through it

If you can please help me....

All help is much appreciated,

Thank you

Answer 1

I think you might be asking how permeability effects absorption of rainfall into the soil. Gravel has a high permeability so the water will be absorbed quickly into this soil type it will also flow through faster and it will retain less. At the other extreme clay you have a very low permeability so the water would be absorbed slowly and you would have a large amount of runoff/flooding. The other two lie somewhere in between these extremes. Sand toward gravel and silt toward clay.

Answer 2

I think that permeability and absorption are 2 different issues. Clay can absorb water between crystal planes and swell (illite) and also has a low permeability due to its cohesiveness which is due to its net surface charge. These properties are lost as the grain size increases. With increasing grain size there is also an increase in pore space and a decrease in surface area and thus producing higher permeability. I think that absorption of water is more do to mineralogy than grain size. Where as grain size would effect permeability.
maybe you are confusing absorption and infiltration?

Answer 3

Permeability is going hand in hand with porosity in maximum situations. the better the permeability and porosity, the extra only groundwater will bypass. You do have situations like limestone the place the rock has an extremely low porosity, yet using fractures can also have a extreme permeability. fall down carbonate rocks type using above undertaking in limestone. Rain water is needless to say purely a splash acidic. this could bypass interior the path of the fractures interior the limestone and bit by employing bit will dissolve the rock. over the years this could type a cave. In aspects like north Florida it is termed Karst Topography.