Restinga is a term currently used for the vegetation on the poor and sandy soils of the coastal plains of Brazil. The soils of these environments have been poorly studied. The counties Cananéia, Ilha Comprida and Bertioga were selected for this research due to the representativeness of the environmental conditions of the state of São Paulo. In these environments 31 soil profiles were described and sampled, many of them in chronosequences. The samples were characterized chemically and analytical evidence converged to elucidate the main mechanisms involved in the genesis of Spodosols, which are of widespread occurrence in the Restinga environments of Sao Paulo State and across Brazil. For these purposes, routine analytical procedures for soil survey and classification were used, as well as selective dissolution of the elements Fe (dithionite-citrate, oxalate and pyrophosphate) and Al (dithionite-citrate, oxalate, pyrophosphate, CuCl2, LaCl3 and KCl), resulting in the following interpretations: (a) most studied Restinga soils had a low sum of bases and base saturation, strong to extreme acidity, cation exchange capacity depending on the organic matter and dominated by exchangeable Al, with increasing content and stability of organic carbon with depth. These properties reflect the influence of both the parental material and the main predominant pedogenetic process in these environments: podzolization; (b) Al is the main cation in the podzolization process. The reactive forms of this element are Al-humus complexes and poorly crystalline inorganic compounds; (c) Al-humus saturation is highest in some spodic horizons with "s" subscript (Bs, Bhs and Bsm) located at the base of well-drained profiles and the metal-carbon interaction among all samples and horizons studied is stable; (d) there is a close relationship between Spodosol age and the chemical properties analyzed: the oldest (Cananéia) are differentiated from the others by higher mean content of C and active Al (exchangeable Al, Al oxalate and Al pyrophosphate) and greater stability of the interaction in Al-humus of spodic horizons; and (e) the spodic horizons studied were formed mainly at the expense of eluvial horizons and queluviation processes of Al-humus and its immobilization in depth through Al saturation in organo-metallic complexes migrating in the profile.
selective dissolution; dithionite-citrate; oxalate ammonium; Na pyrophosphate; CuCl2; LaCl3; podzolization; Spodosol
