Respect for the little guys

Plant root and soil microbial communities perform many vital functions in natural ecosystems. They are also vital for supplying our cultivated plants with optimal nutrition. It is my understanding that healthy and vibrant soil/root microbial communities are absolutely critical to the plants ability to produce the phytonutrients, so that our food can really begin to act as medicine.

The challenge is, that in most of our agricultural soils these soil/root microbial communities are not functioning well and many species have died out due to how we have mismanaged our soils with practices that include winter fallow improper tillage monocultures fertilizers and pesticides etc.. So the question that naturally is how can we restore these biological communities to a higher level of function in the soil where our food grows.

We can reintroduce some of them by bringing in soils and roots and leaves from diverse natural ecosystems such as forests, native range lands, etc. Some researchers and farmers have been quite successful inoculating seeds with teas from quality compost and vermicompost.

Researchers and businesses continue to culture and develop commercial inoculants. This sample contains an inoculant to be administered as a seed treatment, so as the seed germinates it can start forming a synergistic relationship with these bacteria and fungi right away. You can also mix it into water and water the soil or media around the roots of established seedlings grasses bushes and trees. With prices ranging from as low as $3 /acre for some simple inoculants and upwards to $20 or $30/acre for more diverse and nutritionally fortified concoctions I feel It is a practical tool in our hand. Keep in mind, these are living soil microbial inoculants and need to be kept within 40F to 90F and protected from UV light and placed on the seed not more than 8 hours before planting to ensure viability.

Other things we can do in our gardens and fields to help the microbes to establish thrive and survive for the following year is to provide them with food and shelter. Food is best supplied by the exudates from living roots of healthy plants. This can be achieved by maintaining perennial grasses forbes bushes and trees. In annual cropping systems we can grow winter annual cover crops like small grains vetches clovers etc. We can provide the shelter by keeping the soil covered with plants mulches and plant litter especially when it is hot or very cold. Whenever our management practices like tillage etc. have severely reduced their viability we can inoculate again. Biological diversity is also encouraged by maintaining a diversity of plant species with crop rotations inter-seeding and multispecies cover crops.

2 companies I am aware of, that produce bacterial and mycorrhizal inoculants intended for plants in food production are Mycorrhizal Applications https://mycorrhizae.com/ and TAINIO http://tainio.com/

Some of the Places to buy these types of products

http://www.cropservicesintl.com/product-category/biological-inoculants/ in Portage.

https://www.bfgsupply.com/ In Kalamazoo

The product sample is the biocoat Gold from Advancing Eco Agriculture https://www.advancingecoag.com/store/BioCoat-Gold-c20998048 I really appreciate the knowledge that they make available to the public so I like to buy from them. https://www.advancingecoag.com/webinars

This sample packets, I have handed out, includes 2 grams /.07 oz of this product https://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/251708_2fc4660c358a4d1299fa11ac1260bf2e.pdf , which is enough to treat 1 lb of small seeds. My intent to share these packets is to raise awareness of the access to a range of microbial inoculants and the critical role of these plant root/ soil microbes to grow truly healthy food and regenerate the soil for a better future.

We started using this specific product last year in our garden. I didn't invest the time and effort to do much of any side by side comparisons test plots etc. This year I also used a No till drill and planted inoculated seeds in strips through my pastures and will be on the lookout for signs of increased growth and/or preference by my sheep and chickens. At this price point I basically just leave it to the experts to do the research, and I just put it on. Things to measure in a side by side trial could include looking at growth healthy color taste/flavor disease and pest resistance drought resistance root size and the soil aggregation around it, and on and on. I would expect to see a bigger difference in low fertility and dry conditions.

A significant difference in regenerative food production vs conventional is looking to nature to learn how we can improve the nutrition of our food, while reducing and in many cases even eliminating our dependence on chemical fertilizers and pesticides while not only sustaining but actively regenerating the fertility and biological functions of the soils we manage. Following is a list of some of my favorite videos podcasts and websites pertaining to soil microbiology.

https://www.youtube.com/user/livingwebfarms/videos https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChBze-XMnkgWJ4mgaaIoYFw/videos

https://www.youtube.com/user/mrintegralpermanence/videos https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNI_ZA1T4n5dIbB1kO57QIQ/videos http://www.amazingcarbon.com/

Dwight

Eichorn Family Farm 52931 Summit Rd Leonidas MI 49066 CELL 269 364 9621 eichorns@gmail.com