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  • From: "sal" <sals@rain.org>
  • To: "permaculture" <permaculture@franklin.oit.unc.edu>, <OGL@LSV.UKY.EDU>
  • Subject: Fw: Compost, Mycorrhize Alternative to Methyl Bromide in Strawbe
  • Date: Fri, 31 Mar 2000 18:18:46 -0800



----- Original Message -----
From: "Steve Diver" <steved@ncatark.uark.edu>
To: "sal" <sals@rain.org>
Cc: <sanet-mg@cals.ncsu.edu>
Sent: Friday, March 31, 2000 1:24 PM
Subject: Re: Compost, Mycorrhize Alternative to Methyl Bromide in Strawbe


> Sal wrote:
> > This is not the way I heard it. what happen?
> >
> > http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/np/mba/jan97/calstraw.htm
>
> Sal noticed that the story on alternatives to methyl bromide in
> California strawberry production -- as summarized in the USDA
> article from January 1997 -- don't match with the results that have
> been generated in following years.
>
> Essentially, Sal is correct in pointing out a time warp between this
> early article from USDA, and the truly amazing results which
> have been generated in proceeeding years. I was there on tour
> through the fields near Santa Maria with Frank Sances and Elaine
> Ingham in '95, and I have followed this story for many years.
>
> What happened is that early results were dissapointing. The first
> batch of compost wasn't too good. One of the California ag
> consultants said don't use this low quality compost, but that was
> what was available. Thus, early results on compost plots were poor.
>
> But then the Luebke family from Austria came to California and did
> their Humus Management seminar and taught the Controlled Microbial
> Composting classes and some of the innovative farmers started making
> high quality compost. The list of progressive California farmers
> and crop advisors getting into CMC compost is impressive. That's a
> long story. But to summarize the impact think of compost technology
> in the United States Before-the-Luebkes and After-the-Luebkes. The
> impact is still reverberating in places like Georgia where CMC-based
> compost teas have been show to *arrest* certain diseases on peppers
> universally considered fatal in the vegetable industry.
>
> [Note : I can also point to many other innovative compost and
> humus management systems and the people behind them, so please don't
> have a belly fit just because I have listed one system. But in this
> instance the research is directly tied to the CMC compost process
> which enabled this research to propell forward. The fact remains
> certain innovations are taking place in organics and they are people,
> concept, management, and product driven].
>
> With access to CMC compost, which is known to have well humified
> organic matter and high quantities of a diverse set of microbes
> present, Sances and Ingham went towards a compost-based potting
> mix that was additionally inoculated with mycorrhizae fungi.
>
> The data resulting from the following years, when these strawberry
> plugs with high quality compost and mycorrhizae fungi were added
> as treatments, was outstanding. The first year strawberry plugs were
> equivalent in yield to methyl bromide treated plots. With these
> results, proof is now in hand to show a shift in the soil foodweb can
> serve as an alternative to a toxic soil fumigant like methyl bromide
> in commercial strawberry production. In proceeding years, the data
> has gotten better and better. Ingham reported these additional
> results at the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Conference in Georgia
> just this past January. Sances and Ingham will publish these results
> in a journal, one day, but I don't think journal articles are a
> priority for either pioneer who are very busy working with farmers
> and other ag people runing as fast as they can to keep up with the
> biological farming revolution underway on many, many farms that are
> conventional-now-but-rapidly-going-biological.
>
> The data that shows equivalent yields between compost-mycorrhize
> amended strawberry plugs versus methyl bromide was published in:
>
> 1996 Annual International Research Conference on Methyl Bromide
> Alternatives and Emissions Reductions, proceedings of a conference
> held November 4-6, 1996 in Orlando, Florida.
>
> I should add that the Center for Agroecology and Sustainable Food
> Systems at University of California-Santa Cruz is another place
> where organic strawberry production has been underway for some years,
> again with good results based on the use of compost and other
> soil-health building practices. This is the organization that used
> to be called the Agroecology Program. It is a world class source of
> education and research on biodiversity, agroecology, biointensive
> gardening, and organic farming.
>
> Center for Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems
> University of California, Santa Cruz
> http://zzyx.ucsc.edu/casfs/
>
> And by the way, there is a superb website on agroecology and
> biodiversity at the following web link. It is a joint effort of the
> the Center above located at UC-Santa Cruz (Stephen Gleissman and
> associates), as well as by Miguel Altieri and associates at
> UC-Berkeley. I just love this website!
>
> Agroecology
> http://www.agroecology.org/
>
> Perhaps our friends at UC-SAREP have more results to share on
> organic strawberry production. That's another website worth
> listing, it is chock full of incredibly useful articles,
> publications, and databases supporting organic and sustainable
> farming.
>
> UC-SAREP
> UC Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program
> http://www.sarep.ucdavis.edu/
>
> And secondly, I should add the USDA website on Methyl Bromide
> Alternatives is a great source of information. It attempts to
> summarize some useful cultural, microbial, and biological practices
> underway to achieve natural disease and nematode control *without*
> the use of toxic soil fumigants. That is why I was so impressed in
> October '97 to post some of these results on Sanet.
>
> Methyl Bromide Alternatives On-Line Newsletter
> http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/np/mba/mebrhp.htm
> http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/mb/mebrweb.htm
>
> Steve Diver
>
>




  • Fw: Compost, Mycorrhize Alternative to Methyl Bromide in Strawbe, sal, 03/31/2000

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