There is a common thread that connects Colorado soil ecoregions; and this is the fact that all soil is alive. It does not matter the parent material, management approach, or microclimate. Soil is a natural resource and a habitat teeming with life. The vigor and fertility of unique soil sites will vary based on stewardship and management approaches, but taking a closer look at soil biology helps us to better understand how agricultural systems can foster optimal soil ecology, which in turn, supports crops — by increasing favorable physical and chemical conditions.

Around 10,000 years ago, the expansive area encompassing regions commonly known and referred to now as the great plains, the mid-west, the wheat, soy, corn belt, and the prairie—began to form after a series (thousand year intervals) of glaciation events. This was and is the North American prairie biome and it began to form in sheets of what geologists refer to as till plains—from east of the Rocky Mountains, stretching to the Mississippi, all the way up to Saskatchewan and down to the border of Texas.