Have you any ideas as to how you could maintain the AMF in a field without having to resort to re-innoculation ?
Cover crops, inter-croping??
Don't plough, don't grow brassicas and use less fungicide, although not all fungicides are detrimental.
Any ideas which fungicides may be most damaging Simon? Strobs?
or better still, come to Groundswell and talk to Plantworks (who developed the package)http://www.lgseeds.co.uk/news/limagrain-launches-advanced-soil-conditioning-package/
might be worth going to grass and muck next week to check this out?
Ok, lets not get carried away here, do not forget that soil microbes and fungi need dead organic matter to breakdown and live off in the first place. Don't just go reaching for a product that you perceive will solve the problem.or better still, come to Groundswell and talk to Plantworks (who developed the package)
I rather agree, I was just saying Plantworks will be at Groundswell, they know rather more than Limagrain I imagine. They are doing some interesting stuff...probably of more use to people who are mullahing their soils and need to repopulate them with friendly biology.Ok, lets not get carried away here, do not forget that soil microbes and fungi need dead organic matter to breakdown and live off in the first place. Don't just go reaching for a product that you perceive will solve the problem.
If you've got the dead plant material then the bacteria, fungi and other organisms will be along to break it down and release nutrients etc etc.
I'm not saying these additives aren't useful, because I don't know as I've not tried them.... BUT there are a number of wider issues that have to be remembered.
Also check out this link showing how to grow and inoculate AMF on farm DIY:
https://rodaleinstitute.org/a-complete-how-to-on-farm-am-fungus-inoculum-production/
Very impressed with Rootgrow. In another area spoke with a Hosta grower who takes cuttings and with Rootgrow can produce 4 saleable hostas in half the time of splitting the mother root. His neighbour rents out fields and carrot fieldsman came asking which of the two varieties in the field was his. Reply was that same variety sown on same day but one half of field treated with Rootgrow. The difference was remarkable.I rather agree, I was just saying Plantworks will be at Groundswell, they know rather more than Limagrain I imagine. They are doing some interesting stuff...probably of more use to people who are mullahing their soils and need to repopulate them with friendly biology.
I'd also say that a lot of these soil creatures (especially mycorrhizae) need living roots, not just dead ones