Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[<activism98201@verizon.net>]

I was under the belief that humas isn't any final product or can be in any 
state of suspended animation, but that it's constantly evolving, breaking 
down.

If this were not the case then I'd think that we'd be mining humas (from 
"humas mines").


-Mark Nagel
Everett, WA


=====================
From: Dieter Brand <diebrand@yahoo.com>

  Paul,     My use of the term subsoil may have been a bit too liberal. I 
guess, I should  have said the lower part of the topsoil. There is probably a 
technical term   for this. Anyway, my intended meaning was that layer, in 
undisturbed soil,   where permanent humus can be stored under anaerobic 
conditions for a long   time, and which is covered by a few inches of aerobic 
topsoil where organic   material is broken down under aerobic conditions, but 
which is not yet stable   humus, even if it looks nice and black. In 
traditional agriculture, the inversion   of these two layers by ploughing is 
the principal cause for the loss of natural   soil fertility.

[snip]