Not all soils are the same, whilst they may share common ancestry or histories, each will have variations. Soils are formed primarily from the weathering of rocks with the external influences of climate, organisms, relief (slopeness) and time all playing an important role in shaping it characteristics. So whilst they can be classified into groups, they still have individual variations. Wind erosion researchers are beginning to utilise this feature by using new technology to “fingerprint” dusts and trace this back to soil types in an attempt to define source areas.
Each soil type has a different susceptibility to wind erosion. The highly aggregated soils such as black earths and ferrosols have a low susceptibility. Sandy soils common to the Mallee region or desert loams are highly vulnerable. These soils generally have low aggregation, variable soil moisture and the tendency to disaggregate with disturbance. Measuring the susceptibility (or erodibility) is complicated due to numerous interactions between the various measures.
Soil erodibility has been measured with such measures as soil strength, crust cover, wind tunnel simulations, quantifying the loose erodible material on the soil surface, aggregation levels, particle-size characteristics along with chemical analyses. No one measure has been successful, with all the properties varying both in time and space.
Although wind erosion is a natural process the rates of naturally eroding areas or erosion of marginal areas can be enhanced via anthropogenic disturbances. The most devasting example is the “dust bowl” era of the 1930's. Vast areas of the Mallee country lost millions of tonnes of soil directly through inappropriate land usage. Trees were removed and soil cultivated to grow wheat. The sandy soils relied on the vegetation cover for protection. Overgrazing along with recreational vehicle usage are other forms of disturbance.