While texture describes the percent of each sand, silt and clay, soil structure is the organization of these individual soil particles into a larger arrangement. The size and orientation of the particles affect acceptance and treatment of wastewater in the soil.
Soil structure develops over time, typically many hundreds to thousands of years, through physical and chemical weathering. Examples of forces forming soil structure include freeze and thaw cycles, wetting and drying, plant rooting and invertebrate activity. Some of these processes are physical or chemical such as the binding of materials to clay particles, freezing and thawing, wetting and drying, and
