The soil is a complex and dynamic organism
The soil is vital to everything that lives on Earth; if we want healthy bodies & a healthy planet then we need healthy soil. So we must make choices that encourage this & support farming systems that feed the soil rather than deplete it. Soil is a miraculous substance, a place where air, water, minerals & micro-organisms can work together to nourish plant growth, but they must be present in the right proportions. A healthy soil has good structure & consists of approximately 25% air, 25% water, around 40% minerals & up to 10% organic matter. Natural systems build such soils & modern farming practices degrade them. The normal rate at which nature builds soil is around 0.2 tonnes per hectare per year, yet the rate at which it was recently being lost on US farmland was measured at around 40 tonnes per hectare per year! The reasons for this dramatic loss lies in the increased wind & water erosion facilitated by the removal of surface matter (mulch & cover vegetation), natural windbreaks & the effect of ploughing (& digging) in particular.
Whilst ploughing is done to accomplish certain tasks, there are so many more reasons why we shouldn’t do it. The structure of the soil is vital for healthy plant growth, but ploughing damages that structure in several ways. When the level of organic matter in the soil falls below 3.5%, the soil structure cannot be maintained. Ploughing permits excessive amounts of air into the soil, which oxidises this organic matter, causing it to break down & as a result this structure is lost. Most arable land has only 1-2% organic matter & a close look at any such field will reveal a compacted unhealthy looking soil. No wonder farmers are throwing so many chemicals at it to get anything to grow!
The work of worms has been long unappreciated...
Ploughing & digging also has a direct impact on vital soil life. Earthworms, who aerate the soil with their tunneling, are killed in great numbers by the mechanical action of the plough or spade. Similarly, micro-organisms (which interact with plant roots to enable them to take up nutrients) mostly live in the aerobic conditions near the surface of the soil, but are killed by being buried deeper by the plough or spade. The final insult to the soil by intensive farming is the use of tractors. On steeper land, a tractor can only plough up & down the slope – which maximises water erosion down the channels they create. The evidence for the insanity of this practice can be seen in streams & rivers during & after heavy rain & on the white tops of fields of chalk farmland from where all the soil has been lost.
So it’s time we started putting the life back in the soil & there are various permaculture practices that can encourage this. Most importantly, the soil prefers to be covered, either by living plants or by leaf litter (which earthworms will drag down under the surface & convert into great compost). This simple act will halt erosion & start to build the soil again. It will reduce the extremes of day & night temperature & provide a habitat for beneficial soil organisms to thrive.
Fallen leaves create a perfect mulch
If we mulch with well-rotted compost we also feed the soil in a ‘slow-release’ fashion, which avoids the dramatic changes in pH associated with ‘digging it in’ & the ‘burning’ effect that it can also have on plants. If necessary we can provide additional aeration for the soil with a fork (or on a commercial scale with a sub-soiler), which allows air in without disturbing the different layers. To maintain good structure, we’d be well advised not to walk on our garden beds as compacting the soil, expels the air & affects essential drainage. This is why appropriately sized raised beds with clearly defined paths are such a good idea.
Only a well balanced soil is going to grow us truly nourishing food. If the nutrients aren’t available to the plant, then they won’t be available to us either. So it’s never been more true that we get back what we give out.
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Absolute TOSH!
If that’s what you expected to see in these replies BUT your primal wisdom tells you this post makes the ultimate sense, join me & say so. If you can take me to see any soil in nature exposed to light I’m there. After floods, landslides & other natural dramatic changes nature re-covers the soil with vegetation as fast as it can. The worst thing, therefore, for soil is light!
Turn the clocks back? Scrap all the equipment? Not a bit of it.
If it’s possible to destroy soil with mechanisation imagine how effectively soil could be developed, improved & re-balanced with it.
Good idea to make as much high quality soil as we can, right now?
When there’s no fuel for the tractors & the stores have been emptied
the only survivors will understand how to build soil that grows proper food.
I don’t understand Philip’s comment – you seem to be disagreeing with the article, yet draw the same conclusion that uncovered soil is bad. I’m a bit lost as to what you are actually saying in relation to the article Philip – sorry!
Great, so when’s it happening? We’ve had proper mechanisation on farms for over 50 years, yet I don’t see the equipment that can do a better job than natural systems in re-balancing the soil. And indeed, when oil gets too expensive or runs out, how will me make this equipment, let alone power it.
The urgency of the situation will soon be upon us. We need to encourage smaller families (there are too many people on the earth), we need to find better ways of living which work with nature not against it – we need to realise that natural systems have been working for hundreds of thousands of years, yet in the blink of an eye, mankind and destroyed so much.
Improving knowledge changes our perception of soil and how to work with it. Those of us starting out on the road to sustainable self sufficiency need articles like this to point us in the right direction, keep up the good work.
Thanks Mark,
It’s scary how much important stuff we didn’t get taught in school isn’t it? Aranya
Phillips comment sure is strange!
This article makes so much sense, let nature do what it is good at! There is also some interesting ideas about incorporating carbon into the soil giving homes for microbes, holding onto nutrients etc which also seems logical in that in nature there are fires which would naturally leave carbon pieces in/on the ground.
I think a sense of irony was intended by Phillip, perhaps not conveyed well by plain text!
Yes there seems to be a beautiful feedback mechanism that Gaia has used to keep a stable temperature, necessary for life to exist, on Earth over several billions years. As the sun has increased its heat (it’s supposedly 25% warmer now than when life began), there has been much less need for CO2 in the atmosphere to reduce radiant heat from the Earth’s surface. As the sun warms, increasing slightly the surface heat, more plant growth occurs, soaking up some of the CO2, allowing more heat to escape. This Carbon ultimately ends up sequestered in the soil. The system has worked beautifully until we started digging the carbon up again and releasing it back in the atmosphere again! DUH!
Just a practical query -
Am I right in thinking that the ash from a woodburner makes a good fertiliser, and if so what is the best way to introduce it?
And, from time to time as a last resort I may need to burn coal (sorry folks) in my new place until I can sort something better out. What would be the effect on soil of introducing the cinders etc from a coal fire? If this is inadvisable, can anyone think of a sustainable use for this stuff without having to take it away somewhere?
Advice would be welcome -thanks
Hi Helen, I am using my neighbour waste ash from his coal fire to build a cement wall (Low strength one, as I understand it this might be what breeze blocks are made of)
My neighbours seem to grow veg successfully in ground that appears to be mostly the waste from the last 200 years of coal fires! I have heard however that such waste can contain heavy metals so personally I would avoid it.
I use wood ash from my stove on my land but the main thing is that it is not old building wood as apparently wood from about the last hundred years can be treated with chemical nasties!
There is no nitrogen content to ash but it does have lots of goodies. I believe I read somewhere that it is best added when the growing season starrts as it may be fairly soluble. I stir mine into a watering can.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_ash
Hope this helps
Tony
Hi again Helen, here is an interesting article
http://forestry.oxfordjournals.....l/79/5/563
Yes, I understand that wood ash (as long as it isn’t from treated timber) is definitely good for the soil as it contains good amounts of potash. Better added to soil directly (sprinkled on as a mulch) as adding to compost alkalises the heap, which will reduce the microbial activity you want there. Obviously if you already have very alkaline soil (growing on chalk for instance) or you are growing acid loving plants, then it won’t be helpful!
Coal ash is another thing entirely & considered too full of heavy metals that plants growing there can accumulate. Another good reason to use wood rather than fossil fuels!
Thanks Tony and Aranya for your help – the internet can be a wonderful thing – so much information!