Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[Emery Mitchamore <emitch@att.net>]

OK, now that you've revealed that you're not a "dumb farmer" ;-) I've got a related question: What (microbes?) produce ammoniacal N, that trees most prefer, and how do I encourage them?

E. E. "Mitch" Mitchamore
www.hillcountrynatives.net

On Dec 13, 2010, at 1:56 PM, John D'hondt wrote:

Sorry for being so late but my modem gave up for almost a week.

First of all, I would like to find out in what form "nitrogen" is being bound to charcoal; N2, NO, ammonium nitrate, urea or does anyone know if charcoal binds to any of these for real and for sure?

 

Suppose this is true then what is the exchange mechanism by which plants are capable of taking up this "nitrogen"? Nothing is ever for nothing in nature, what do plants have to give in return to get the "nitrogen" And how does one explain the explanation that the charcoal after having given off it's "nitrogen" will stock up with new "nitrogen".

Sorry but this goes against some fundamental laws of thermodynamics.

 

Charcoal is the oldest and one of the best wood preservatives used by mankind because it is virtually completely inert. It will remain unaltered for near eternity. It is deader than a dodo.

 

What I do know for certain and this is well documented by scientific research is that there is about 8 metric tons of "nitrogen" pressing down on every single square meter of surface of the planet. What is also known is that there are a good few micro organisms that can convert this N2 gas into biological useful molecules that can be exchanged with plants in symbiosis. Many bacteria will give plants amino acids or whole protein chains and also vitamins such as vitamin B12 in exchange for plant made sugars.

 

This is a virtually unending pump as long as the micro organisms are given a substrate to work on. In my case that has been saw dust and wood shavings from mostly Sitka spruce.

john

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

From: richard green

To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org

Sent: Thursday, December 09, 2010 4:47 PM

Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] Charcoal Crushing/inoculate the charcoal??

Deb I put the crushed charcoal in a 5gal plastic pail covered the charcoal with the liquid fertilizer and let it soak for a few days,I got a snap on lid from tractor supply to cover the bucket, some reccomend soaking for two week but I only did it for three dayish. I grow both summer and winter gardens here in north florida. I have garden beds 12ft by 4ft as the beds were being converted to winter crops I tilled(small hand claw) in two buckets per bed on average along with COF and compost. I purchased 10 bags of all natural hardwood charcoal, two bags of which await crushing and one bag thats being soaked as we speek the bulk has been incorporated into the beds. Ive recently been puting it into the compost pile as a nitrogen source after soaking.

Rick

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