serf
Member
- Location
- warwickshire
Lol 
Soil health strategy
- Thread starter delilah
- Start date
wanton dwarf
Member
Pretty obvious that after decades of chemicals being used - what you say "might happen" hasn't happened. Quite the reverse in fact.
You did dodge the point though.
How do chemicals reduce soil organic matter ?
wanton dwarf
Member
wanton dwarf
Member
Yes constant ploughing COULD have an effect. But it would have to be a soil with enough biomass within the soil profile in the first place. So for a soil which has been ploughed - that isn't a peat based soil - there would be little net effect.
Chemicals of course do increase biomass by creating larger more vigerous plants, plants which are not diseased and plants which are free of pests.
- Location
- DD9.
Same with preservatives in food. What do they do to our guts?
- Location
- North Yorkshire
Fords and sustainability were never really bedmates anyway
Dying grassland turf after ploughing releases acids….not sure of the effect.
Nitrate fertilisers also have an acidifying effect……and farmers add them.
So after decades of chemical use you say our soils are in better health than ever?
wanton dwarf
Member
Dying grassland turf after ploughing releases acids….not sure of the effect.
So after decades of chemical use you say our soils are in better health than ever?
Define "Health".
Farmers grow crops, without a doubt those crops have higher yields and cause less harm to humans thanks to chemicals and the biomass we add to land.
For someone who doesn't understand farming and hates farmers our soils will always be not healthy.
Oh dear these idiots want to tell us how to run our lives, couldnt trust them to know the day of the weekLol
- Location
- somerset
the truth is, we really don't know what the long term issues are, with a lot of the chemicals we use, either as crop sprays, animal health, or the crap in processed foods, they haven't been about long enough to know. We do know, many have been proven to be bad, years after using them. But if people wont pay for good food, they have to take the risk of 'harm' in the future, they wont pay, so, what will be, will be.
I do think modern sprays are definitely better than previous, but the additives added to processed foods, is certainly worth further checks, or avoidance.
I do think modern sprays are definitely better than previous, but the additives added to processed foods, is certainly worth further checks, or avoidance.
- Location
- Hertfordshire
Nitrogen reduces organic matter. There’s a static carbon:nitrogen ratio in all living things. For example, as you know, straw has a very high level of carbon relative to nitrogen (c.90:1?). When it breaks down in the soil it locks up N due to the microbes doing the decomposing needing to draw N out of the soil to maintain their own particular, and much lower C:N ratio (between 8:1 and 20:1, from memory, depending on the type of soil microbe).
The opposite happens when you add N. The microbes need to take in extra C to balance their own ratio, they do this by breaking down organic matter (which happens to be high in C).
wanton dwarf
Member
wanton dwarf
Member
We don't add Nitrogen to bare soil. We add Nitrogen to growing crops.
Nitrogen increases plant growth and capture of the energy of the sun - hence giving greater biomass which could or could not be incorporated in the soil.
Your description of Microbes is incorrect. Decomposition isn't driven solely by Nitrogen or the lack thereof.
The main factors involved in decomposition are temperature, water and air/oxygen.
- Location
- Carmarthenshire, West Wales
nitrogen fertliser, causes more bacteria, they need a ratio of Nitrogen to Carbon, Nitrogen is added to the soil, so the Carbon comes from organic matter, that is my reading of what happens.
wanton dwarf
Member
Yeha I could be wrong on that scale as I was looking at household ammonia whereas I should be looking at Urine.
wanton dwarf
Member
Is this a significant driver in a growing crop though ? Perhaps an issue for peat based soils ?
- Location
- Carmarthenshire, West Wales
I think we can see the long term effects of the food we eat, rising obesity rates and metabolic disorders, the question I suppose, is what parts of the process are causing these effects?
- Location
- Carmarthenshire, West Wales
I think the way we farm has and is effecting soil, I am sure the size of machines hasn't helped either
serf
Member
- Location
- warwickshire
I know , it's a joke ...