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permaculture - Re: [permaculture] [soilandhealth] Organic matter percentage

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  • From: Neil Bertrando <neilbertrando@gmail.com>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] [soilandhealth] Organic matter percentage
  • Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2011 12:16:16 -0800

this might be a reasonable way to jumpstart a system towards a state of
on-site carbon cycling and sequestration via incoming sunlight and
photosynthetically active radiation.

I think an important aspect of this process is the management plan to
retain SOM and encourage it's development on-site. if we don't use
management practices that build soil then we'll still lose SOM regardless
of whether we import it or grow it on site for a short period of time.

Neil

On Mon, Dec 26, 2011 at 11:12 PM, Toby Hemenway
<toby@patternliteracy.com>wrote:

> Although 50,000 lbs sounds like a lot, it's only about 20 cubic yards per
> acre, 40 at most. So it's not that hard to boost SOM using compost (even
> though I'm a big fan of mulches).
>
> Toby
> http://patternliteracy.com
>
> On Dec 26, 2011, at 3:13 PM, Glenn Gall wrote:
>
> On 9/18/2011 2:03 AM, m_astera wrote:
> > How much compost or manure would one need to add to raise the Soil
> > Organic Matter SOM content of an acre of soil 6" deep by 1%?
> >
> > SOM percentage is calculated by weight, not volume. The convention
> > used is that 1 acre of soil 6-7" deep weighs 2,000,000 (two million)
> > pounds. Or a hectare of soil 15cm deep weighs 2,000,000 kg. One
> > percent of that is 20,000 lbs/acre or 20,000 kg/ha
>
> >
> > Compost and manure can be assumed to be around 60% moisture and 40%
> > dry organic matter. So
> >
> > 20,000 / 0.40 = 50,000
> >
> > To add 1% organic matter to the top 6" or 15cm of soil would require
> > about 50,000 lbs/acre or 50,000 kg/ha of organic matter at 60%
> > moisture content.
>
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