Healthy soil and sustainable growing

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There's a lot of mystery to the Mycorrhizal relationship that plants have, resulting in many misconceptions and misinformation.  The Pacific Northwest Rainforest is a cool forest that favors fungi for the decomposition of organic matter, which is slow process.  Bacterial Humification is still part of the system but is not as active as the fungal decomposition.  Consequently, the total amount of humus or Humic substances that accumulate in the Northwest forest floor is less per 100,000 calories of biomass recycling than will be found in the Great Plains Tall Grass Prairie.  I other words if you have exactly the same amount of organic biomass when comparing the calorie value of the biomass, the hot grassland Ecotone will favor a bacterial Humification resulting in more humus than the NW Rain Forest.  Therefore the large fungal network that Marty speaks of are actually more likely to be Saprophytic fungi involved with the decomposition of woody lignin parts of dead organic matter and can be seen by the naked eye during certain times of the year.  The mycorrhizal fungi for the most part are very small and not so visible and are more involved with feeding their host plant water and mineral nutrients.  Mycorrhizae feeding tubes or filaments do not venture far from the point of articulation with the host plant roots. 

 

When soils are destroyed by construction, fire or other events the mycorrhizae will return as do the native plants, but the process is very slow. For that reason, viable inoculation products that have been studied by universities have found consistent benefits by using these products in landscapes, golf courses, tree farms and even on Organic Farms that have been well managed and organic for decades.  We also see the same thing happen when we put  a pure biologically viable humus into a Pacific Northwest Soil that you would think is already rich in humus, huge benefits are derived.

 

Michael M. Melendrez