1 know where the stone and the pieces of root belong when we come back to get 2 a tare weight for the nonspecimen soil. 3 Vegetation is cut into quarter-inch increments (REECo 73). We found 4 _it turns out to be much quicker than to leave the grass long because then 5 we: don't end up with a sieve covered with grass. 6 “goes -threugh the sieve. almost all The grass does grind and There is a mandatory requirement to wear rubber 7 gloves “for of the processing steps. We use a steel brush 8 (REECO 74) to-dislodge soil from stones that are large enough to pick up. 9. We went to. a_steel brush because we can clean it effectively in a sonic 10 cleaner. 11 Cleanup.is a critical step in the whole procedure. We transfer the soil into the cans (REECo 75) and clean them off as 12. they leave the pseudo glove box (REECo 76). They are dried 24 hours at 13. 105°C (REECo 77). 14 in the processing. 15 took a wet weight of the entiré specimen as it came from the shipping bag. 16 We also weigh the bag itself, the-tape, the tag that's inside, the stones 17 and the roots to get a tare weight’for- the wet weight (REECo 78) from the WhHethe drying is going on other activities take place We go back . and we get into the data collection. 18 field specimen. We . 19 After the sample has been dried, we “get into the processing proper. 20 Grinding is-done by steel balls, rotating inside of a can that is turning 21 at 22 (REECo79) because that works the best or has withus. 23 note that all of the information that we have about-the specimen goes onto between 130-140 rpm. We use 10 balls “for 24 the meta) can as well as into the record books. 25 a 2,000-gram specimen In passing I might —~-- __ - The ball mill is.a series of rollers (REECo 80). Each section, if you 26 wish, will grind 10 one-gallon cans. They grind initially as shown on 27 Figure 29 for three hours. 28 for an hour, sieve again, regrind the remaining coarse material and sieve We then sieve them, grind the coarse material 143