Improving soil a necessity if we are to sustain ourselves

By MARY POWERS | Special to the Commercial-News
January, 2009

It’s Jan, 14, 2009 and 5 degrees outside the Riviera Theatre in downtown Three Rivers. To the eye it looks like our soils are sleeping. Inside, more than 120 people from across the Midwest and as far away as Nebraska and California have braved arctic conditions to attend the first annual Soil Symposium sponsored by Flowerfield Enterprises.

Flowerfield Enterprises was founded by the late Mary Appelhof and is now owned by Nancy Essex of Three Rivers. In the 1980s Appelhof worked to start recycling programs in Kalamazoo County. After that she turned her efforts to her first love, worms, writing the book “Worms Eat My Garbage” which is sold worldwide and printed in at least six languages. Appelhof knew that improving soil is a necessity if we are to sustain ourselves. Dr. Elaine Ingham of the Sustainable Studies Institute (SSA) at Corvallis, OR, reiterated that message, reminding attendees that it is possible to restore dead soil and rebuild even serious erosion with the use of well-made compost and Aerated Compost Tea.

Ingham believes that traditional soil additives such as chemical and salt-based fertilizers, ammonia and lime are damaging our soils and diminishing our ability to produce abundant crops. “Stop killing your soils with your chemical addiction,” she adamantly stated and added that “what we need to do is add large amounts of well-made compost to our soils to reintroduce beneficial organisms. If you are trying to grow a certain crop and your soil needs more fungi the compost or tea can be made to support that need. If your crop needs more beneficial organisms a batch is made to meet that need. If you want to improve a home garden or flower beds, emerging orchards or young forests the same holds true.” Dr. Charles Cubbage, semi-retired environmental consultant and retired toxics expert for the State of Michigan, was an attendee and not shy to say “Michigan has a great opportunity to benefit from recognizing the importance of soil ecology and the benefits we can reap from improving our soils because of our niche farms.”

The last decade has seen a dramatic increase in public demand for safe, locally grown and produced food products, lawns and golf courses. While the number of large farms may be decreasing, the number of small “niche” farms is on the rise and they all want to know how to increase yield safely, produce animals and eggs and cheese without chemicals and generally live and produce food in a safer environment.

When asked whether he has seen progress in Michigan farming over the years, Cubage stated, “We have mistaken synthetic chemical ‘nutrients’ as a way to manipulate the natural system and we see that in the long run it fails us. A lot of research money is spent on synthetic products but as of yet no large funders have become available to study the great resource God has given us, Nature.”

The Sustainable Studies Institute works with farms and businesses around the globe to improve Nature by identifying soil deficiencies and meet the needs of a particular area. Ingham encouraged participants “when you increase beneficial bacteria and fungi in soils, the protein content of grains and grasses can be increased substantially per bushel/acre.”

If the words fungi or beneficial bacteria strike terror in your mind you are not alone, but fear not – they are good things for us and we would be better off with more of them.

We would be better off if we used fewer chemicals, watered/irrigated less and did not compact our soils. We would be better off if we composted yard waste and kitchen scraps and used the compost in our own yards and businesses. We would be better off if we understood that minute intricate life exists in our soils whether it’s 5 degrees or 95 degrees and that we are stewards of it.

So, it you want better tasting strawberries or a more vigorous rose plant determine your fungi to bacterial ratio. How to do this?

Call Nancy at Flowerfield Enterprises on Shaver Road. Nancy and her staff are SSI trained to read qualitative biological assays of soils, compost and compost tea. They can answer most questions and if not Dr. Ingham is just a Skype away.

source: Three Rivers Commercial-News

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