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livingontheland - Re: [Livingontheland] Heating up a compost pile to Paul & Carol

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  • From: Nancy Babbitt <nbabbitt2003@adelphia.net>
  • To: Healthy soil and sustainable growing <livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] Heating up a compost pile to Paul & Carol
  • Date: Mon, 3 Jul 2006 08:17:50 -0400

Thank you Paul.

Roots of living plants in combination with microbes, produce humus. Do I have it right?

I'll read the links you included on glomalin.

Carol, I am not trying to be argumentative or mis-informative, just someone who is trying to get a better understanding. Maybe, it shows . . .

I'm a fairly new gardener.

Nancy,
On Jul 3, 2006, at 12:51 AM, TradingPostPaul wrote:


I don't write as a soil expert but as a learner. It's my understanding that
most plants form symbiotic relationships with mycorrhizal fungi, and it's
the fungal hyphae that produces the glomalin that aggregates clay particles
with certain elements and biological compounds that ends in what we call
humus. This does not happen in the compost pile but in the soil with plant
roots. Finished compost is not humus.

You say
If compost then
gets disturbed to add to garden or field, then again there is a risk
to losing any humus that has formed, because it will get exposed to
the air.
and
You just stated that oxygen breaks down humus. That is why I suggest
not turning a pile to heat it up (oxidize?). Am I correct in
believing that if it's necessary to get air into a pile to make it
heat up, then it's the oxygen that's allowing the the process that
heats up the pile to take place, therefore it is oxidizing the pile?


As I said, humus isn't formed in the compost pile, but in the soil with
plant roots. Turning the compost to aid in heating and speed decomposition
won't oxidize humus that isn't there yet.

Some interesting sites on glomalin
http://ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2003/030205.htm
http://invam.caf.wvu.edu/methods/mycorrhizae/glomalin.htm
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/AR/archive/oct97/glomalin1097.htm
http://abstracts.co.allenpress.com/pweb/esa2000/abstracts/ MAT-3-58-40.html

And esp Organic Matter, Humus, and the Soil Foodweb at
http://attra.org/attra-pub/PDF/soilmgmt.pdf


I hope that helps.

paul, tradingpost@riseup.net
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