Ithaca Central High School science teacher Robert Tuori is conducting a study to examine short term changes in soil health at Nook And Cranny Farm, a diverse vegetable farm, as an independent research project for the USDA Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Fellows.
Utilizing both the microBIOMETER® and Cornell Soil Health Assessment, Robert and students will compare tilled vs non-tilled soil in 4 crop beds, each containing either brassica or cucurbit, and flipping crops midseason. The beds were covered in October of last year with a cocktail of winter rye, vetch, and triticale. These cover crops were grown until early May, then covered with a black silage tarp for one month. The brassicas were planted into hay mulch while the cucurbits were planted into biodegradable plastic mulch.
Robert is particularly interested in looking at easy, on-farm testing, as well as lab analysis. They will conduct microBIOMETER® testing on each bed three times throughout the season: before planting, midseason before second planting, and at the end of the season. For the lab based analysis, they will measure nutrient levels in each bed at the beginning and at the end of the study, as well as perform the Cornell Soil Health Assessment on all four beds at the end of the study.
[IMAGE: https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1615053835734-7752878e939e] Credit: Unsplash
Regulatory initiatives have developed carbon trading prospects to combat carbon emissions, providing specific industries with an “allowance” for each tonne of carbon dioxide they emit annually, known as carbon credits. This initial allocation of carbon credits can be free of charge, and businesses are presented with more opportunities to buy or sell carbon credits. Companies with reduced carbon emissions can sell their excess carbon credits to participants who have increased emissions— forming the carbon market.
A feature on global issues by Maryville University notes that emissions of greenhouse gases must be halved by 2030 to avoid a climate catastrophe. However, global economies representing 90% of all such emissions have yet to commit to cutting carbon outputs at sufficient rates to meet this goal. Through the formation of the carbon market, businesses and organizations may be more incentivized to cut down on carbon emissions through the use of carbon offsets. These voluntary schemes come from groups that already have active carbon reduction plans, aiding buyers to work toward carbon neutrality by reducing emissions elsewhere.
As more governments, businesses, and organizations join the carbon market, individuals and smaller organizations can find it difficult to purchase emission-reducing carbon credits. Furthermore, the voluntary carbon market often lacks transparency and quality control, so there is a greater need for more accountability to open up new markets. As shared in a review on blockchain solutions by One Earth, blockchain technology has become a means to improve the integrity and accessibility of carbon markets. Because it’s a publicly available record and a third-party intermediary is absent, it can avoid ambiguity over ownership and double counting emissions reductions while reducing administrative costs across the system.
These unique processes can streamline and accelerate the carbon market digitally, allowing organizations and individuals to meet their carbon footprint reduction goals much sooner. Furthermore, the global economy may become more efficient and effective in supporting climate action as funding is distributed more transparently.
Many are aware that agriculture, especially animal agriculture, greatly contributes to carbon emissions. However, the development of soil carbon capture systems and farming practices such as regenerative agriculture has significantly reduced agricultural emissions, even lowering existing carbon emission levels through soil carbon sequestration. Our post “How microBIOMETER® Changed the Farming Practice of a Syntropic Farmer” shares how regenerative agriculture is kept up sustainably: soil maintenance is regularly monitored through soil microbial count and the use of natural soil supplements, promoting soil development to capture carbon effectively. These methods prevent soil desertification and provide a great opportunity for farmers to turn climate-friendly agricultural practices into carbon credits.
Companies like NORI establish carbon markets in support of regenerative agricultural practices that perform as carbon removal solutions. A third-party validator measures land management practices and crop data to assess the impact of a farmer’s regenerative practices, providing credibility and transparency to how much carbon can be removed per contribution. Through the reliability of the blockchain system, the carbon market is sure to flourish, granting more people the freedom to make a positive environmental impact.
Written by Sophia Logan for microbiometer.com
This article was provided to us by Scott Hortop, a retired volunteer and now student of soil, located in the Ottawa Valley, Ontario, Canada. Scott wants to use his retirement to do one important thing for the climate.
At ONfungi we own two microBIOMETER® soil testing kits which we use to determine the fungal to bacterial ratio (F:B) of the Johnson-Su fungal dominant compost (FDC). The ONfungi group makes FDC from tree leaves.
We are excited by the potential of leaf mold to:
• Reduce agricultural dependence on external inputs• Divert leaf organics from landfills• Replenish the inventory of carbon in the soil by drawing down the carbon in the atmosphere• Grow knowledge about working with mother nature to address climate change
Our first FDC bioreactor batch was started in Spring 2018. Since then, we have put up a total of 15 batches; 8 of them in fall 2021.“It took us 3 batches before we faced the fact that we needed to know whether what we were producing was actually what we hoped it was. Our enthusiasm needed to be grounded. What is the fungal bacteria (F:B) ratio in our FDC?,” says Scott Hortop, wizard of compost for the ONfungi group. “This is why we have found the microBIOMETER® to be our most useful tool.”“Dr. David Johnson’s talks have shown us eloquently how the F:B ratio is the most meaningful indicator for soil health”, Hortop explains. “As we share our fungal dominant compost (FDC) with other users, we owe them a solid measure of what they are getting. When we and others share our FDC experiments with each other at the Chico State University Registry of Johnson-Su Bioreactors, the majority of us have been unable to report F:B ratios. This has now changed. With the microBIOMETER® we can confirm that we have the right ratio of ingredients by taking a real measure of the F:B ratio.”Its All Relative – Isn’t it the change and the direction of changes that we really need to know? Of course, it might be nice to think every microbe was identified and counted under a microscope, but that precision comes at a HUGE cost and most likely doesn’t alter the conclusion. The next thing we need to do to strengthen the microbial community.
Immediacy – When you are checking in on living microbes in soil, some of whom are reproducing and dying in a matter of minutes and others taking years, the best timing for a test is here and now. In a world rich with distraction and delay, its awesome to get a result from your testing efforts immediately.
True Cost Per Data Point – For the purpose of our bioreactors, give it a think: the modest variable costs per test, the modest labour to execute a test which is just minutes beyond the time required for sample collection, the VERY efficient and effective recording of results, and the $0 sample shipping cost.
In an ONfungi citizen science trial last summer by one of our volunteers in White Lake, Ontario, 2 sunflower seeds were planted in late June into moderately degraded farmland (microBIOMETER® F:B 0.7:1; 464 µg C/g).The control seed (left) received no soil amendments. The 2nd seed (right) was planted with 50 grams (a small handful) of Johnson-Su fungal dominant compost (microBIOMETER® F:B 1.7:1; 700 µg C/g) surrounding the seed. For 8 weeks both plants received identical, adequate watering. The 8-week photo below shows the control sunflower on the left suffering from an invasion of cucumber beetles with less than ½ the height and 1/3 the stalk width compared to the sunflower on the right with FDC at its root zone. Although beetles were observed on the FDC sunflower, some disease resistance was evident.One of ONfungi’s targets this year is to do monthly tests on completed FDC material to chart the staying power and degradation curve of finished FDC, not yet put to use and in several storage modes. We are also using the microBIOMETER® to look at carbon sequestration in lawn soils.About ONfungi; ONfungi is a happy conglomeration of active volunteer folks. Their goal is to explore, through citizen science, the use of Johnson-Su fungal dominant compost (FDC) in improving soil, storing carbon, and enhancing plant health and nutrition. Learn more at ONfungi.net
Jeff Lowenfels
Jeff Lowenfels, a valued advisor and member of our Board, was recently featured in the New York Times Sunday Magazine article, He Wrote a gardening column: He ended up documenting climate change.
For 45 years Jeff has written a gardening column for the Anchorage Daily News and over this time has helped adapt Alaskan growers to their much longer growing season. And in doing so has become a documenter of climate change.
Jeff joined Prolific Earth Sciences because he knew the only way to wean agriculture off synthetic fertilizers was to trust the microbes to deliver nutrients to plants. Jeff is the well-known author of the all-time best selling gardening book, Teaming with Microbes, as well as Teaming with Fungi, Teaming with Nutrients and DIY Cannabis all very readable, informative and available on Amazon.
Soil testing
Modern agriculture practices have led to the systematic degradation of the world’s soil and release of carbon into the environment. The effects are increased need for expensive and environmentally dangerous inputs (fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides), the loss of fertile top soil, decrease in water holding capacity of soil and dangerously high levels of atmospheric carbon.
Farmers, industry, and environmentalists are looking for cost-effective and reliable ways to measure soil health, to assess impacts of progressive changes on soil and harvest management, and to measure carbon in soil. Before microBIOMETER®, growers have traditionally relied on expensive lab testing of soil. Many current methods are technique and individual lab dependent. Therefore, run-to-run and lab-to-lab variation can greatly affect consistency leading to increased variability. Current methods are performed in labs and the soil is aged and changed from the time of collection. Furthermore, lab tests are difficult to use in developing countries as they can cost upwards of $500 per sample. This makes the test prohibitive to some markets and limits the number of times a grower can test their soil.
Our mission at Prolific Earth Sciences is to enable soil stewards all over the world to use mobile technology and our low-cost soil test to assess regenerative soil practices, to improve soil health, and work towards increased soil carbon sequestration. microBIOMETER® equips growers with the data necessary to make decisions on which practices are the most cost-effective. Inputs such as fertilizers are expensive and changes to practice are risky. Monitoring soil microbial biomass inexpensively, in real time, can help a soil steward quickly assess if an input and practice is improving soil health and worth the investment. In other words, assess before you invest! We also envision microBIOMETER® one day being a powerful tool in the measurement and audit of carbon sequestration programs.
microBIOMETER® has been on the market for over 3 years with direct and distributor sales and currently has customers in over 20 countries.
Soil carbon is important to soil health because it enables microbial life. Microbes are able to obtain carbon directly from plant exudates, however, much of their carbon source is from the dead plant and plant derived materials that they digest. We harvest much of the above ground matter from crops, but plant roots, cover crops and various manures can provide additional sources of carbon and other nutrients for microbes. Pure carbon, for instance coal, is not something we add to soil to increase fertility. It is the soil organic carbon, the carbon originally derived from the living plant, animal and microbial sources, that predicts soil health. This is because it is food for microbes. Without fungi and bacteria making the glues that allow microbes to stick to soil and create soil texture, the soil becomes a powder that is easily eroded and does not hold water. Moreover, without microbes that are so tightly bound to the soil to store nutrients, the soil becomes barren.
Soil carbon begins as plant exudates and dead plant material and ends as humus, the molecular remnants of the bodies and refuse of dead animals and microbes that digested the plant material. Newly broken-down plant material is close to the surface and available to microbes as soluble organic carbon. Using this easily accessible carbon, microbes can multiply. Furthermore, carbon that is in microbes and other inhabitants of the soil food web can be viewed as a savings account. Turnover in the food web is rapid and these materials are being recycled. As organic carbon molecules become in excess, i.e., they are not rapidly recycling, they attach themselves tightly to minerals and clay. In this state they are more difficult for microbes to access. They begin to descend deeper into the soil becoming even more closely associated with soil particulate matter and can now be described as sequestered carbon. The amount of carbon your soil can potentially sequester depends heavily on the particulate matter of your soil. Some soils can accumulate as much as 20% others probably less than 3%.
Earth has surrendered 50% of its sequestered carbon to the atmosphere. How did this happen? As a plant starts to grow, it sends out exudates that stimulate the dormant microbes to start multiplying and working to bring nutrients to the plant. If there is insufficient soluble organic carbon available, the plant stimulated microbes will need to mine carbon from stored carbon sources. Over many years of non-regenerative farming, the microbes have depleted this stored carbon. Mineral fertilizers have replaced the microbes bringing minerals to the plants, but they do not provide carbon for microbial growth. Moreover, plants do not put out exudates for microbes when supplied with mineral nutrients – the stimulus for exudates is the need for minerals. The tragic outcome of low microbes is the loss of soil texture which leads to soil erosion and the inability of the soil to retain moisture.
You need to have all forms of carbon for soil health; plant exudates to stimulate microbial growth, newly digested matter, soluble organic carbon for the population explosion, and stored carbon for the poor times when the microbes need to delve into their reserves. You also need to store carbon by feeding the microbes carbon and replacing minerals in a manner that does not inhibit microbial growth. Sequestered carbon is 60-80% the remains of dead microbes.
The microbial population or microbial biomass (MB) reflects soil fertility. For over 2 million years, plants and soil microbes have worked together to create what we call fertile “soil”.
How do they work together? The plant supplies the microbes with carbon rich food. The microbes then mine the soil for the required minerals. Microbes can actually manufacture nitrogen and antibiotics that protect the plant from pathogens in return creating carbon stores that build soil structure and sequester carbon.
Like all good partners, what is good for one is good for the other, i.e., a healthy MB predicts a healthy plant. Therefore, supplying NPK directly to plants disrupts the plant microbe relationship – plants no longer feed the microbes and the MB decreases accordingly. Soils with low MB suffer from erosion, compaction, and poor structure. Sadly, this is how we have lost 50% of the earth’s soil.
Soil microbes, like all living things, need food. They need to be fed carbon and nitrogen from plants or organic matter so they can mine the minerals, P, K, Mg, Cu S etc. from the soil. If there is not enough of any nutrient, including the minerals that should be in the soil, it negatively affects the number of microbes; just as humans do not thrive when we are deficient in a critical nutrient.
Oxygen, water, and an agreeable pH and temperature are also important for soil microbes. Compacted soil is low in oxygen and microbial biomass. As soil dries, microbes die or become dormant. MB is much lower in low and high pH soils than in those that are in the neutral range. This is because most enzymes work best at neutral pH and all metabolism is enzyme dependent. MB also contracts during intense cold and heat. Plant roots require these same conditions
Microbes also need shelter to survive. Soil aggregates provide small cubbyholes that accommodate oxygen and water. It is in these areas where microbes attach themselves to be protected from predators. These predators are larger than they are; think of how little fish hide in coral. Not only are soil aggregates homes for microbes, they are homes built by microbes. The capsular material that microbes secrete to attach themselves to soil particles is long lasting. It binds the soil particles, therefore, creating aggregates that build soil structure and prevent erosion. These aggregates provide the water, oxygen and wiggle room needed by plant roots.
Furthermore, soil microbes build up carbon in the soil by producing humic matter. When microbes die, their bodies become stored carbon. This is good for microbes in the way that a savings account is good us. It is important for the soil as well because the humic matter increases soil structure. This allows more oxygen and water storage. It is also a resource that microbes can take a loan from before harvest when plant material is not being released to microbes. For too long we have relied on microbes borrowing from this humic carbon source and have released ½ of the soils stored carbon to the air as carbon dioxide. This has contributed to climate change and loss of 50% of earth’s soil. Microbes have always worked well with plants to create soil and they can help us restore exhausted soils back to fertility.
