Soil loam soil with a small amount of organic material is considered "ideal", inasmuch as fertilizers or manure are currently used to mitigate nutrient losses due to crop yields in the long term. The mineral constituents of a loam soil might be 40% sand, 40% silt and the balance 20% clay by weight. Soil texture affects soil behaviour, in particular, its retention capacity for nutrients (e.g., cation exchange capacity) and water. Sand and silt are the products of physical and chemical weathering of the parent rock; clay, on the other hand, is most often the product of the precipitation of the
Clay in many natural building techniques, clay is used to create adobe, cob, cordwood, and rammed earth structures and building elements such as wattle and daub, clay plaster, clay render case, clay floors and clay paints and ceramic building material. Clay was used as a mortar in brick chimneys and stone walls where protected from water. Clay Clay is a finely-grained natural rock or soil material that combines one or more clay minerals with possible traces of quartz (SiO), metal oxides (AlO , MgO etc.) and organic matter. Geologic clay deposits are mostly composed of phyllosilicate minerals containing variable amounts of