Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["John D'hondt" <dhondt@eircom.net>]



My idea here would be that compost made from healthy, while they were alive, organisms must per definition be fairly balanced. There should be no reason that in that compost there should be a lot more potassium than calcium especially that potassium has over all much more soluble salts than calcium.

I believe strongly that in a country like Ireland where we have seen years with more than 4 meters of rain most minerals are only safe from washing away when they are inside living (micro) organisms.

And here Liebig's law of limiting factors comes into strong play. Suppose that there is a desperate shortage of an important element like sulfur and after exporting sheep's wool from a place for 800 years that was a problem here. The lack of sulfur is then going to limit the amount of soil life that is possible and even if you had a million ton of potassium surplus I can see that all disappearing with the rain long before the year was over.

john

----- Original Message -----

From: Aliza Vanderlip

To: Healthy soil and sustainable growing

Sent: Tuesday, December 07, 2010 4:03 PM

Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] the learning curve

I think there are two different issues here - OM and potassium.  I think that one needs lots of OM and not to get the potassium too high because it will replace calcium and cause weak plants and an increase in insect pests.  The lack of OM in soils that have had chemical fertilizers on them is way different because the chem ferts also effect the soil bacteria.  I think this is a comparison of apples and oranges.  I am guessing there are many ways to balance soils so that the soil is happy and therefore the plants as well.  Adding scads of OM can be the saving grace or downfall depending on the soil and the OM that is added.  High potassium compost in a low calcium soil will likely give you a major pest problem but that doesnt mean that OM wouldnt be helpful - just not that OM... KWIM?

Blessings,

Aliza
www.eftashland.com


“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” Howard Thurman

--- On Mon, 12/6/10, Harvey Ussery <harvey@themodernhomestead.us> wrote:

From: Harvey Ussery <harvey@themodernhomestead.us>
Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] the learning curve
To: "Healthy soil and sustainable growing" <livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
Date: Monday, December 6, 2010, 6:51 AM

On 12/05/2010 01:47 PM, John D'hondt wrote:
> I followed Steve Solomon's list for a few years and eventually had to give. . .
> - he is dead against building up a soil with compost or organic matter because he is convinced this breeds gazillions of crop eating pests apart from bringing even more unwanted potassium in. ~John

I found some things in his Hard Times book that were bizarre as well.

I just started reading Sir Albert Howard's AN AGRICULTURAL TESTAMENT yesterday. One point he made strongly was that soils with a lot of organic matter produce crops that resist disease--and conversely, disease was on the increase where OM was going down with greater reliance on chemical fert's.

~Harvey

-- Harvey in northern Va
www.themodernhomestead.us

My book, THE MODERN HOMESTEAD POULTRY FLOCK, will be published next year by Chelsea Green Publishing.

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