permaculture

["paul wheaton" <paul@richsoil.com>]

There's all the stuff going on in the soil that we know about.  And
then there are heaps of things going on that we haven't learned about
yet.

As with almost anything having to do with soils, there are more
factors than you can shake a stick at.

One source of nitrogen is rain.  My feeble understanding is that the
rain drop becomes nitrogen rich as it travels through our nitrogen
rich atmosphere.  Somehow, a small bit of it gets carried into the
soil and can be, eventually, taken up by plants.  But if it has to
work its way through a carbon layer first, there might be a lot less N
that makes it to the soil.

Then there is bird/animal/bug poop on the surface.  Less N makes it
through the carbon layer.

And then as the carbon breaks down and teen tiny bits of it get washed
deeper into the soil, that C locks onto N for further decomposition.

Throwing some form of fertilizer on the surface ...  less of the N
will find its way to the soil.

This is probably not the time to open up the can of worms about the
allelopathic effects of many wood duffs, especially coniferous wood
duffs.

And ... finally .... despite all of this gobbledygook ... and all of
the negatives of using a high carbon mulch ....   the positives almost
always outweigh the negatives.

I would say that cedar duff would do more harm than good.

And I would say that I would generally avoid conifer duff even if it
is free.  But I would pay money for alder duff.

Toby - I love your book.  Definitely in my top ten list of all time,
all books.  I seem to remember you mentioning an update  ....  In your
book you list species that make for chicken feed, or N-fixers, etc.
and then later you posted information here about how some are better
than others.  I think that would be a really huge value to us and the
world:  to not just say "chicken feed", but "chicken feed (9)" (heaps
of quality chicken feed per acre grown) vs. "chicken feed (2)"
(provides a little bit of mediocre chicken feed).  Same for N fixing
and all of the other wonderful attributes you list.  It doesn't need
to be scientifically backed - something like "my best guess at this
time" would be better than nothing.  Tap root (or deep reaching roots)
factor would be good too.  Allelopathy  might be a good tidbit - does
not play well in guilds.  Just some ideas ...