Page 14 - MNLGA Free State Spring 2024_WEB SPREADS

IT'S TIME FOR SHARING A Jerry Faulring his article was first published in the

Spring 2012 edition of Free State News.
The Soil Food Web TMuch has changed since then in the

world of soil health, and at least some of you
were not working in our field at the time.

I have read The Furrow magazine by John

Deere and Successful Farming magazine for
decades. Back in 2012, there was a rare article
dealing with soil health. In a recent issue of The

Furrow, 4 of the 8 articles focused on cover
crops, soil health, no till soil management,
and strip tilling. Likewise, the recent edition of

Successful Farming published 2 of 6 articles on
the same topics. All of these articles fall under
the umbrella of soil health.

Agriculture is starting to embrace soil health
as a means of reducing crop input costs while
increasing yields. This article focuses on how

healthy soil can be archived in the nursery
and landscape. I have written extensively how
we use organics as a substitute for synthetic

fertilizer and a unique tillage tool from The
Netherlands (rotary spade plow) to improve
our soils. The results have been remarkable in

many ways.

It is interesting to note why we engaged
organics and also how we may have missed

the opportunity. Winter damage to broadleaf
plants and some conifers started the process.

If we had only been growing deciduous plants,
we may have never seen the need.

The information below tells the story of how
healthy soil works to provide nutrition to our

plants. A future article will review how to make
and use compost to achieve positive results.

(continued on next page )

14 SPRING 2024• Free State News Membership Matters • SPRING 2024 15