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market-farming - RE: [Market-farming] Hard soil inside the High tunnels

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  • From: "David Inglis" <mhcsa AT bcn.net>
  • To: "'Market Farming'" <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: RE: [Market-farming] Hard soil inside the High tunnels
  • Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 10:43:29 -0500

One more perspective.

Another factor may be that it is as difficult to maintain Organic matter in your overheated greenhouse as is it is in the tropics it resembles for much of the year. I think if most of us were to transfer our cropping techniques to the tropical environs that our greenhouse resembles we would end up with similar results: salt burdened, hard packed, low organic matter  unresponsive soils.

Soil OM is  constantly being destroyed and built up, however the formation phase will only exceed the break down phase  when the soil temperature is lower than 65 deg. +/-. The temperature of greenhouse soil is often far above this.

Beyond the given mineral nature of any soil the structure and friability is ultimately dependent on the Organic matter fraction. This is of course true for our outside soils also but the greenhouse environment accelerates the processes at work. A sandy open soil, especially if it is tilled heavily, will accelerate this process even more.

 

David A. Inglis
Mahaiwe Harvest C.S.A.




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