From soil to spoil

What kind of resources can be extracted from a random chunk of raw earth you can find in their garden and/or outdoors, and how? In this thread we discuss all possible physical/chemical techniques (and required equipment) we can use at home in order to turn dirt into something useful.

while it depends from soil to soil, in general some things you could maybe find (and extract with relative ease) are things like iron or silicon dioxide for iron if im not mistaken, you could use a really potent magnet to extract it, and you could probably strain the dirt in order to extratc the silicon dioxide. (mind you that this last part is mere especulation on my part)

>>13055 how to turn dirt into something useful: 1) go to store, buy seeds 2) plant seeds in dirt (ideally during spring) 3) wait. 4) ???? 4) profit!!!

mud bricks cob house if you have a lot of organic material in it, might work for gardening if you have a lot of the right kind of clay, you could make pottery if you have a lot of sand, you could make glass soil varies so widely that it's hard to generalize. most of it is even unsuitable for gardening unless heaveily worked and fertilized. i guess you could always just dig a latrine.