FRACTAL DIMENSIONS OF SOIL STRENGTHS FOR PADDY FIELDS IN CHINA

Spatial variation of soil strengths for paddy fields in China was desc ribed using the concept of fractals. Soil strength was recorded with a cone penetrometer, along a series of transects, at 10 cm intervals. F ractal dimensions were calculated both from semi-variograms and from p ower spectral density (PSD) curves of soil strength profiles. In paddy fields after harvesting, such data gave fractal dimensions very close to 2, reflecting the characteristic nature of such paddy soils. This value implies that they were almost totally random, irrespective of si te, date, direction or location of measurements. The value of fractal dimensions close to 2 corresponds to poor vehicle performance.