All of these factors depend on a even greater one: time. A soil does not just spring up overnight. Nor does it remain a constant. It takes time for all of these factors to play out and bring a soil to maturity. Imagine a region of freshly exposed rock. Depending upon the type of rock, it can take anywhere from a couple of years to thousands of years before any reasonable concentration of sediments begins to pile up. The organisms that can live on this small amount of fresh sediment might do well initially, but as a soil begins to take shape, it might become more advantageous for other forms of life to inhabit it. As the weathering and erosion proceed, the topography of the area
will change, which might even change the climate as weather patterns might shift.