List of State Soils

State soils are official soil series designated by state legislatures to represent each state's land and agricultural heritage. Each is a distinct, scientifically classified soil series identified and named by USDA soil scientists.

Nebraska's Holdrege series (1979) is one of the earliest state soils designated in the United States. Iowa's Tama and most others followed in the 1980s and 1990s. Montana's Scobey series was the most recently designated, in 2015.

Texas's Houston Black covers over 10 million acres of the Blackland Prairie and cracks wide open in drought. You can see the gaps in the ground. Florida's Myakka covers millions of acres of pine flatwoods and is the most extensive soil in the state.

The red color in many southeastern state soils (Alabama's Bama series, North Carolina's Cecil series) comes from iron oxides that built up over thousands of years of warm, wet weathering.

Connecticut and Washington have proposed but not yet officially adopted state soils. All other states have formally designated one.