I have my opinions on the matter but don't have the time, presently to opine.

Until then....

I like the thought that using a good quality compost or good quality feedstock in the sheet composting is sufficient. Whether it is or it isn't I can not say for certain. Given decent weather conditions (sufficient rain and not too hot) my crops do okay on what I give them.

With our soils around here, most gardeners would do just fine adding half an inch of decent compost to their gardens.

YMMV

Lloyd

A theory is that traces are often low, raising them is relatively inexpensive - much cheaper than yearly apps of NPK, and the payoff can be really big.

I prefer to just keep adding the organics every third year, letting them break down in the soil and planting. I might be low on N (especially on the second year crop) but I'm fairly confident the micro-nutrients are there.

Lloyd

I once knew a greenhouse grower who blended his own soil mix. After years of always testing it prior to planting and always getting the same result, he stopped doing it. The next year, he wondered why his hanging baskets weren't growing and found he had a pH of 3.something.

and to steal the thunder of an above post...

Economics. To see if what you are doing, be it organic and natural, or not, is making a difference, or if you are just wasting your time in doing it.

A sample of the harvested wheat is taken in to the local elevator for testing of which the protein content is one. It's all done in a machine, I have no clue as to the science/process of it. Protein content and the grade of the grain are the two big items for spring wheat.

Lloyd

Which is why our food chain is garbage and people are dying of heart disease and cancer.

Lloyd

Agreed. But as an industry, there's tremendous room for improvement. The market doesn't demand (or even ask) for nutrient-dense produce and, hence, there's no impetus to invest in the improvements needed to exceed the status quo. Equally injurious is the "organic" movement which has convinced consumers that "organic" = nutritious. OMRI oversight is designed solely to keep the bad stuff OUT of the food chain. It plays no role in ensuring that the good stuff is there to begin with.

Which brings us back to soil testing. Without testing, there's no way to optimize soil fertility and, as a consequence, the nutritional value of our food. The poster above was correct: we are literally starving amid a sea of plenty--not because we have too little food, but because we're deriving too little nutrion from the food we eat.

Albrecht's "Soil Fertility and Animal Health" is a seminal treatise on the topic.

IMO, optimizing soil fertility is a laudable goal but a decent soil growing a decent crop (food) will do just fine.

I think the vast majority of damage (loss of nutrients) is done in the processing, packaging and preparing versus the growing. Even with optimal soil, the weather can degrade the nutritional value of the food and the human body is very adaptable to variances in food quality.

Don't even get me started on the organic movement. :-)

Lloyd

41, you put the case pretty much as I see it.

I'm sure all these farmers were confident they were growing excellent crops. However, the quality was very wide ranging.

My soil is average, it doesn't get synthetic fertilizers and it grows a pretty consistent 12-13% protein, #1 grade, spring wheat for the eighteen years I've been farming it (other farmers farmed it before me). Yield and grade varies mostly on weather conditions.

Lloyd

I think it was you that showed those great pictures of your composting system. Goes to show, what you put in is what you get.

What a genius that fellow was. I would strongly recommend anyone who has not read that particular article to do so. In light of it, I see that Lloyd is probably correct in thinking that his soil is decent, and I am also correct in thinking my soils are in MA are deficient.

Lloyd: good point about doing everything right and not getting enough moisture to raise the crop, that's life in a nutshell on the plains.

Wayne: excellent and very obvious point about there being differences in soils, take the eastern half of the US with relatively high annual rain fall and the arid west, it's like night and day. Those pioneers from the east that headed out west sure must have been in for quite a shock when there eastern, tried and true farming methods flopped in the west.

Strobiculate: I agree. Hope that grower didn't take it in the shorts too bad on those hanging baskets, a greenhouse can be a very expensive place to make mistakes.

pnbrown: I am certain that there must be an easier methodology to test for grain quality, particularly % crude protein, than micro-kjeldahl digestion method but I am not aware of it. Dry ash would likely work for everything but the %C.P.. As far as soil testing and grains go, you certainly want to be aware of what's going on with your N as it has a direct influence on the % CP which is a biggy for millers (and feeders too I think).

Well let's see, to borrow Kimm's format:

1) to establish a baseline on newly cultivated ground and to spot sections in a field that vary greatly from one another. What I believe is currently being referred to as, "precision agriculture" these days has at it's core the aim to not treat entire fields as a monolithic entity especially when it comes to soil fertility and moisture. It is all very state of the art stuff for large scale farming utilizing things ranging from satellite imaging to GPS to on the fly yield monitors. As an extreme example, precision ag. looks to spot and recognize the vast difference in a field between that 40 acre gravelly area and the 25 acre spot of river bottom loam and that they should be managed differently. No doubt someone farming the area over a number of years could see differences in their crops but not know why that difference existed if they didn't get down to the soil science.

2) Aid in diagnosing the cause(s) of the lack of availability of a given nutrient, I.E. a crop displaying iron chlorosis.

3) To help keep from shooting one's self in the foot, so to speak. I.E. my calcareous, pH 7.4 soil has a 2.8% CaCO3 content, it would be very counter-productive for me to amend the soil with anything containing Ca as there is already so much it is a problem. If I had never tested the soil for Lime I would be missing a crucial piece of information on how to manage it. My irrigation water was tested and found to have high bi-carbonates, which if left untreated will greatly confound the soil problem. In short, without one soil test and a water test, my orchard would have been doomed to failure and I likely would have been pretty clueless to the specific causes. Those 2 tests were well worth the money. Most recently I sent off another soil sample for the orchard partly to allow me to estimate the amount and types of amendments to use to aid in helping to deal with a now beginning case of micro-nutrient deficiency in the young apple trees and am now very near to a sound plan to begin managing the situation.

4) Oops, time to go to bed.

You are right about GPS and farm fertilizing these days. The Coop will know where to add minerals in varying amounts from testing the soil in different parts of a field.

The eastern half of the country has for the most part been leached of some soil minerals, while the drier and western part tends to be alkaline and sometimes loaded with minerals.

1. That there is all the nutrients we need in most diets in NA. The way I see it is that if a healthy 20 something ate a really healthy diet perhaps they would do ok. Problem is, they don't usually eat much of that kind of diet. Also those with less income are not likely loading up on cheaper healthy foods [apples, potatoes, onions, peppers, etc, but often costlier and less healthy "foods". Further, as we age our stomachs tend to produce less acid to break down the minerals we do eat. At the same time our hormones and glandular productions drop off badly while at the same time our reproduced cells and DNA components tend to have degraded quality.

Now, since I am older, I am not interested in being a Soylent Green volunteer.

Which is why I am eager to find some corollary to the refractometer for dry legumes and grain. As of now I have only taste as a measure.

There was an article in Acres USA within the last few months about a farmer who was growing nutrient-dense wheat. He was using a refractometer to measure brix and a "modified vise-grip" to squeeze the juice.

The lousy quality of produce (and meat, of course) in the stores is due LARGELY to post harvest handling and storage. An enormous amount of research has been done over the last 3 decades for many crops and the conditions for storage to maintain high quality over time is pretty well known. In addition, technology has kicked in and provided the ability to create those conditions from the field (in many cases) to the store's produce shelf.

Now, whether or not the knowledge and technology is used or not is, like many other things, based on money. From what I've seen going to the produce depts. of many grocery stores over many, many years is that the low end stores tend to have the poorest produce and that the opposite is true.

If at any point in the chain from the time something is harvested, it is not maintained in optimum storage conditions, it will begin to deteriorate, no way around that.

Of course, if you pick a lousy head of lettuce, it will never get any better in storage.

In short, I believe what is on the grocery store produce shelves is far more the result of the supply chain and post harvest handling and storage ,beginning at harvest, than low quality produce being grown due to lousy soil. On that we may disagree.

Of course, soil testing can certainly be an integral part of producing high quality produce, be it organic or not. to measure is to know.

All and all, it is pretty impressive what can be done to get very high quality produce to the store shelf. There have been, for quite some time, produce companies with hydro-coolers in the field at harvest so that stuff getting picked is stripped of field heat minutes after being picked,, a big help in post-harvest storage life.

" It is not a measure of nutrition, however."

Another absolute statement with nothing offered to back it up, Kimm. Would you hazard a guess as to why I can and have brixed kale from one field at 6 and then another, same kale cultivar from down the road same time of year at 8.5?

Brix does matter...probably for more than taste though taste tells a lot about quality which probably tells a lot about nutrition. Remember those choosy cows from Albrect?

That being said, my mineral assay isn't worth a hoot unless I have a functioning Soil Food Web (the LIFE fraction of the soil from bacteria to earthworms) to process the minerals and pass them on to the plant roots. That's the quick and dirty.

If we don't do a comprehensive soil test, we are GUESSING and if our soils are out of balance, our plants will tell us, our animals will tell us and our TASTEBUDS will tell us. Also, our plants will suffer from insect and disease pressure. So our soils are the PRIMARY and first order of business when it comes to food quality. Yes, storage time is significant but the higher the food quality from the field, the better it stores!

I have used a refractometer for 20 years or more and with it I can monitor my crops AS they are growing to see how well they are doing. Brix is a measure of how efficiently my plants are making sugar - how well they are photosynthesizing. If a crop has low brix, I can foliar feed and make other adjustments that can help the crop, but not always..Obviously I will test the brix of my ripe produce also. In general, if my crops have a brix of 12 or more, my crop will not be bothered by insects and diseases, but there are always exceptions.

From my chair, Organic means no poisons, only natural soil inputs, etc. It does not infer superior nutrition and superior yield - that depends on how well I carry out the above. I have personally grown a few crops in past years that tasted so bad I just tilled them in. They were not worth eating but they LOOKED good.

I will end this by inviting everyone to visit my informational website, thedoublevictorygarden.com. I am not in business so I guess I can do this. My best to everyone and we all need to keep learning as much as possible about our most valuable resource on earth - our soils. Popeye.

"There is only one story - the trick is to tell it a thousand different ways." William A. Albrecht, Phd.

What I have been made to understand is that the clarity or haziness of the refractometer field is even more important than the absolute percentage, where the former indicates the level of complex vs simple sugar molecules. Complex molecules require a wider range of available minerals. A high absolute number can be obtained merely by pumping in the NPK. Complex sugars are much better in the diet than simple.

Testing a wide range of produce I find that clarity/haziness factor in the same crop varies more than overall percent of sugar. Yesterday, for example, I went to a highly mineralized citrus grove. Best looking trees I ever saw in my life. The whole grove is infected with greening as well as other common infestations that are destroying the industry rapidly right now, and the trees show no signs whatever. The owner has been reducing the chemical fert and mostly using microbial humate and various forms of azomite for the past five years. I brixed one of those tangerines against a typical one from a different grove - same % sugar but the good one was hazier. When tasting the former the taste is complex and lingers, while the latter is simply dead sweet and flat. The former smells much better, fragrant, the latter smells rotten.

Meanwhile, citrus at our place we have been working on for years, adding OM, irrigating, some small amounts of salt fert with traces, they hardly grow and fruit little and the fruit is unremarkable. I learned yesterday that most traces are given in oxide form because it is cheap and citrus in particular cannot take it up in that form, and very poorly in sulfate form. It needs to be ionic and microbial. OM grown in impoverished soil will never have the minerals in any form.

Your comparison of the well mineralized tangerine says it all - full flavor vs blah, etc. See, your tastebuds also tell you! Humates and microbial inputs are activating the minerals, in other words, LIFE! Chemical salt fertilizers can't do this. I have been using true humus and MYCORRHIZAE in my soils for 3 years now and I have entered a different world!

Nature has been using mycorrhizae ever since plants have been on earth. 95% of plant roots on spaceship earth form the mycorrhizal relationship and we can innoculate our soils and seed with them. I swear by 'em. Once again, Mother Nature RULES!

"The terms humus and human are from the same root and mean that we are from the earth. They are also related to the terms humor, humorous, and humility. Therefore when gardening, it's important to keep a good sense of humus." Michael Martin Melendrez, Soil Scientist, Researcher, Educator and Inventer.

On soil testing it really a pain, it can be expensive and difficult, unless you are raising a lot of food crops, I would not bother with it. If grow you flowers and they are doing well, why bother soil testing? I would do if I was consider adding a huge amount of something such as lime, but I don't like to go big scale and do something unnatural to the soil, that be very well undone if it turns out that was the wrong thing to do.

Tropical - I suppose there might be some theoretical exceptions, but generally speaking, you won't get mycos from your kitchen compost. It's possible to "grow" mycos--let's say by inoculating a cover crop--but unless you're doing it on a commercial scale, I can't imagine it's worth the effort. And, compared to a lot of stuff we put into our gardens and soils, they're dirt cheap :)

tropical thought, If you're happy with your results, that's great. Also, it isn't possible to get mycorrhizae from compost.

Manufacturers innoculate host plants or seeds with mycorrhizal spores, grow the plants then harvest the mycorrhizae from the roots. The plants are then composted. This is a labor intensive process and is the only known way to reliably get them. If you want to buy them (which I do) ask your potential source for a spore count per pound of material. There are propagules (broken pieces of hyphae) and spores (think of them as eggs). Hyphae might reproduce but spores are almost 100% viable. I want spores.

My suggestion is to google mycorrhizae and learn as much as you can about them. Hit YouTube for some great videos. Hit my website thedoublevictorygarden.com and you will get some more info. Blessings to us all.

How do we kill 'em? Till 'em! They are not usually found in agricultural soils, tilled garden soils, construction soils, etc. because we chop them up pretty good and they are slow to come back. Chemical fertilizers can make them go dormant or get lazy and some create toxic conditions that kill them. The mycorrhizae say, "Why should we go out and look for plant food - this soil is overloaded already!" Fungicides also wipe them out.

Happily we can inoculate our soil and seeds with them and once established, they are there to stay unless we do the above. It has been stated that plants with mycorrhizae operate 7 times more efficiently with them than without them! Mycorrhizae research has been front burner stuff in the soil science community for at least the last 10 years and there are some outstanding mycorrhizal products on the market now. There are also some that suck.

As stated above, there are roughly 5% of plants that do not form a mycorrhizal relationship, in fact some plants are toxic to them. The entire brassica family kills them and there are others. This means that I plant my cabbage, broccoli, brussel sprouts, mustard greens, etc. in separate beds not inoculated with mycorrhizae.

As I have said before, google mycorrhizae, visit my website (thedoublevictorygarden.com) and hit Youtube for some excellent videos from the foremost experts in the US.

I will end this with a challange - get some mycorrhizae and do some side by side trials. I think you will be amazed. I was.

Having a natural balance of compost which bring and feed mycorrhizae, will create a buffer.

Like said above, soil tests were not invented untill 1950 (is that true???) so that says something.

What did we do when we did not have a soil test lab results???? How did we farm the same plot for years and years with or without crop rotation?? HOW???????? WOW!!?!?!?! hahaha ;)

Nothing lasts forever. With the advent of chemical farming, agriculture shifted to an NPK diet - and not necessarily "good" NPK either. Not only were many nutrients omitted from the fertility regimen (secondary macros, micros and trace elements) the harsh fertilizers burnt out the humus and rendered the soil lifeless. The focus was on the yield--more produce, from less land. In less than a century, much farmland was "used up."

Now, fast-forward to the 21st century. The land most of us have inherited is no longer "virgin" - it no longer has that vast store of balanced nutrients. The manures and composts we use are the products of less-than-perfect soil. They play an important role in soil building but, by themselves, they can not contribute mineral elements which they themselves do not contain. That's where the soil test comes in. By telling us what we have (and what we don't) we are able to re-balance the mineral nutrients in the soil; we are able to re-start the cycle that was broken many years ago.

I would add that the current state of general de-mineralization is not just the result of bad practice on a huge scale over the past century but also earlier (severe overgrazing in the east of north america, for instance), and also simply eons of rainfall since the ending of the glaciation in the areas that we now produce our food in.

You already pointed out that the brassica family kills mycorrhizae. They also help, kill off fungi and nematodes....kinda purifying the soil. This is useful too.

Cut to the dust bowl years of the 1930's when soil blew all over the place, Grapes of Wrath, etc. The farmers then (like the colonial farmers before them) continued to burn the humus that had been laid down for millennia out of the soil, mostly by tillage. A Native American during the westward expansion was said to have watched a prairie farmer plowing a field up using a moldboard plow and was said to remark, "Wrong side up."

Here in Cochise, Az., the farmers are now tilling the pivot irrigated fields for spring planting. The high winds of spring are cranking up already - Last year and the year before I have seen them as high as 70 MPH and dust storms so violent that visibility was no more than a couple hundred feet. This happens every year and will happen again this year.

Humus and the Soil Food Web isn't important to modern agriculture - the soil is nothing more than a medium to hold the plant. We fertigate and spoon feed the crop NPK and perhaps a trace mineral or two if the crop requires it. GMO's are being grown everywhere. Most nitrogen fertilizers and rescue materials are petroleum based and getting more expensive each year. Not sustainable.

"Having a natural balance of compost which bring and feed mycorrhizae, will create a buffer."

MG, do you have a reference for that statement? I sure would like a source, 'cause unfortunately, it ain't true.

As stated before, plant roots leak sugar into the soil which attracts them and the mycorrhizae do their symbiotic thing. When the plants die and the root systems break down, the mycorrhizae have no food so they go dormant until next year's plants put out more sugar and the cycle repeats. Spores are TOUGH! They overwinter quite well and some of the fungal hyphae overwinter also and regrow.

Root feeding nematodes - A mycorrhizal root system is so dense with hyphae that the nematodes can't penetrate it! Pretty cool. Another benefit.

The brassicas form different microbial relationships than mycorrhizae and do very well in their specialized environment. I hadn't heard of them killing other fungi and nematodes though. Could you supply a reference? In general, 90% or so of soil microcritters as well as insects are good guys - eating and keeping the bad guys in check and destroying disease organisms as well. All without our help. We would do well not to disturb their activities.

"SEE what you are looking at." Dr Carey Reams, Phd., founder of the Reams system of agriculture.

MG, do you have a reference for that statement? I sure would like a source, 'cause unfortunately, it ain't true. "

Yea my reference is thousands of years of growing crops with no soil tests. ;) Sorry I had to. ;)

So what you are saying is that you need a soil test to grow food to feed yourself???? "do you have a reference for that statement? I sure would like a source, 'cause unfortunately, it ain't true."

sound familiar?

I'm still learning, and conversations like this only serve to make us all better informed, if not better gardeners. It's a great thread because of the discussion and information, but also because of the skepticism and disagreement, and for the civility that has endured despite it. It is a pleasure to have so many thoughtful voices taking part.

Currently I use A & L Labs in Plains, Tx. I used A & L, Memphis when I was in Tn. 20 miles north of Memphis. (1986-2004) I had 8 and a half acres of god awful clay and the tests brought me up to speed pretty fast. I marketed some sweet corn and got rave reviews for the outstanding flavor. By the way, I am NOT a market grower. I am an experimenter, researcher, grower and word spreader with 41 years experience on acreage and backyard gardens - I am a "soils man". I worked for Jep Gates, a professional farm consultant for 5 years (1995-2000). Google gatesbioag - he is in Australia now and consults from one end of the continent to the other, has his own organic fertilizer plant and has now moved into New Zealand. He didn't do so well in Tennessee and Arkansas because his farmers were growing great cotton, livestock, etc. using his organic and biological inputs and the chemical fertilizer companies were badmouthing him. The farmers believed the chemical propaganda and Jep lost a lot of clients. The Aussies are more astute.

Acres, USA - "The Voice of Eco-Agiculture" I have read them since 1977 and from my chair, they are are the best we have. Virtually all of the scientists and practitioners of organic and sustainable agriculture have appeared in Acres over the years. Charles Walters Jr, the founder, (now deceased) was one of the stalwarts in this field. Google HIM. Acres USA conferences (put on annually) have drawn people and experts from around the world. He was great friends with William Albrecht and interviewed him numerous times. Dr. Albrecht gave Charles Walters his entire body of scientific papers that he had written over the years while at the U of Missouri. They are archived at Acres USA. A word of advice - don't badmouth this publication until you have read it for 5 years. The body of knowledge about agriculture as well as the dangers of toxic rescue chemistry, microwaves and fluoridation are all backed up by GOOD science and research, that defined as science and research that hasn't sold out to vested interests not interested in the truth, just their selfish monetary profits.

Wayne_5, go to soilsecrets.com and meet the foremost authority on humus and mycorrhizae, Michael Martin Melendrez who puts out the finest products in those fields. He is the industry leader and known worldwide. He lectures extensively at the university level as well as USDA and NRCS. His product line is second to none and I am going on my third year of using them in our desert soil in Cochise, Az., some of the worst growing soil in the U.S. The results have been astounding on two start-up gardens in two separate locations with different soil types. I describe this on my website, thedoublevictorygarden.com.

MG, You been growing plants for thousands of years? WOW, I am impressed! It is hard for me to believe that taking the Master Gardener course for a few months then doing some field work for I don't remember how many hours and Viola! You are a master gardener! I investigated that program when it came out and read the manual. A lot of good stuff that I already knew and a lot that wasn't so good, so I didn't take the course. When I got to Tucson in 2004 I spent a day at the county extension facilities where they hang out. They had a 3 bin composting set-up with no compost in it and I was told that it was just for teaching... What they were good at was advising callers about which killer stuff to use for the many problems that growers had because they weren't knowledgeable enough to grow a healthy plant that didn't get sick and wasn't infested with insects... I feel that I know a little about soils and growing after 41 years and I could become a master grower if I had 39 more lifetimes. (sorry, I had to.)

Gentlemen, I hope this provides the sources you were asking for. I am not a "people say, everyone knows, its common knowledge, etc." kind of person. I go to the experts and run trials in the field. Blessings to us all.

I am a newbie to this forum but I can offer some professional advice on the topic of soil testing. I am a professional landscape contractor in southern New Jersey.

In my business, it is standard practice for me to do a soil test for new customers. pH, organic matter content and soil structure are the primary factors that I am testing. When all are in balance, my job is a walk in the park. Well balanced soil allows grass and landscape plants to thrive using less fertilizer, less irrigation and less worry about disease or insect infestation.

A significant portion of my customer base has been brainwashed into thinking that a lawn needs the "5 Step" application process. Ask anyone who knows, the last thing anyone should ever do to their lawn is apply 5 applications of nitrogen, weed killer or chemicals in a broadcast format and especially fungicide when no fungus is present. Appling that amount of nitrogen is like feeding your child nothing but candy or an an adult with a primary diet of coffee or soda. This process eventually strips the soil of organic matter and necessary nutrients leaving grass and plants very susceptible to drought, disease and despair.

Ideal soil should have a high level or organic material, drain well and have a pH reading in the range of 6.5 to 7.5. Established lawns only need 1 inch of water per week and should have 3 deep, soaking type waterings per week instead of a shallow watering every day. These practices encourage roots to extend deep into the soil where the water is stored. A university level soil test helps determine these factors and provides a plan of attack.

States throughout the country are passing very strict legislation controlling the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus that can be applied. The truth is that the majority of the chemicals associated with lawn and garden fertilizers wind up in our waterways causing significant algae blooms. The increase in algae limits sunlight infiltration and deplete oxygen levels.

Times are changing. Any thoughts???

"This process eventually strips the soil of organic matter and necessary nutrients leaving grass and plants very susceptible to drought, disease and despair."

Despair! Is that referring to the grass itself or the person trying to grow it? Heehee

I have been reading some old farm, garden, and soil books from about 100 years ago. These books give a perspective that we don't know much about.

Most of the early settlers came from western Europe and began farming like they did in the old country. Back there they had mostly gentle rains and not the cloudbursts which wash away uncovered soil and leached minerals away. It was a hard learn and oft times when a farm was "worked or gullied out", they just moved west to repeat the same mistakes.
In the old books it was lamented that farm prices were low and that farmers had to struggle just to feed and raise their usually large families. Tennant farmers might sell the farm manure just to eke out their living.

Let's face it folks, when there is no extra money to invest in the soil, it likely won't get invested in. I have been blessed to have the time and money to upgrade my gardens. For the farmers left around me, they are all big farmers. Any other kind just can't survive unless they have a niche market and are working themselves nearly to the bone.
Big money men are coming out of the big cities and investing their money in land for tax purposes. This has driven farm land prices nearly through the roof..

If you lasted through this, kudos.

You do not NEED a soil test but they can HELP.

I like the edit option.

Mycorrhizal Applications is an excellent site and they have a downloadable list of the plants that use endo, the ones that use ecto and the plants that use neither. Soil Secrets is excellent but doesn't come up by google but they are working on it.

Yardwork, I was born in 1943 and raised in Sewell, NJ. Where are you? I had an organic lawncare and landscape business from 2000 to 2004 in Memphis then I moved to Tucson, Az then to Cochise, Az. where I am now. Will check out your site.

MG, True, farmers have been farming for thousands of years in some places but many peoples including our own Native Americans were nomadic and didn't destroy their land. You might want to look at a book - "Farmers of 40 Centuries" about the Chinese farmers. They returned everything they could back including their own "night soil". Even so, they have suffered periodic famines and lost millions of people.

From antiquity the Egyptians got their annual shot of fertility when the Nile river flooded and receded each year. That all changed when the Russians built the Aswan Dam in the 1950's for hydroelectric power and Egyptian agriculture has gone down the tubes ever since because there are no more annual floods. Today their agriculture is just as chemicalized as ours, that's the only way they can operate.

I stand by my guns - soil testing is necessary if we want to recover our mined out, deficient soils. Composting helps but isn't everything. We gotta know our mineral profile for good results.

novascapes, Neal Kinsey has a column in Acres USA every month. He is one of the top consultants in America. If you read my post about the brass tacks of soil testing, notice that I mentioned positive and negative charged elements. Anions have a negative charge and Cations carry a positive charge. I didn't use those terms cause I didn't want to throw in two new terms to an already complex subject.

kimmsr, Having our macros in order has nothing to do with having our micros in order. Are the macros Nitrogen, Calcium, Phosphorous, Magnesium, Potassium Sulfur and Sodium the same growth nutrients as the traces Iron, Zinc, Manganese, Copper, Boron and others not tested for like Cobalt, Molybdenum and a whole list? I can't imagine a reputable soil scientist saying that and if its true then why are the micros tested for at all? I would not listen to anyone saying that. Blessings to us all.

Concerning mycorrhizae - In the last 10 years there have been over 50,000 research papers and scientific studies about their benefit. Yes, they originally came from nature ever since there have been plants, as I stated before but we have set them back or destroyed them by our agricultural practices. Finally, you know that they are snake oil because you have tried them, right? If you have not then you just don't know and are voicing an opinion not based in fact! I HAVE tried them (starting my 3rd season) and done some trials with and without and the differences have been spectacular. Obviously we are all free to do what we want - all I am saying is that I don't badmouth anything unless I have TRIED it. Nuff said.

Even though there might be some minerals left in a low fertility soil, these minerals might remain unavailable in the soil synergy they have.

And he was right. Over 40 years later you can still walk around his fields and see bright white broken shell pieces all through his soil.

Thanks for posting the address of your website and thanks for providing so much wonderful information there. As a lifetime learner in the joys of gardening, I found your site to be extremely useful. I now have another good source of educational material to read each morning waiting for spring to arrive.

Also, my guess is that you took the name Popeye from your many years in the navy. Thank you for your service to this country.

But we don't just stop with plant health unless it is flowers to admire. We humans need micro nutrients and it is amazing how complicated it is since new discoveries are being found for more and more micros. Elements like scandium, yttrium, chromium, vanadium, cobalt, strontium, molybdenum, cesium, and probably many more are cropping up as needed for optimum health.
kimm, as you keep preaching, OM is a key part of the nutrients being able to find a full synergy to be absorbed by the soil. Good.

Doctors are not trained in nutrition and tend to diagnose symtoms and treat those symtoms rather than seeing the body as a whole holistic unit rather than a collection of parts like a lawn mower.

Vermontkingdom, Thanks for taking a look at my site and thanks for your kind comment. You're right. I was tagged with Popeye and I like that little dude. Always have since my childhood.

Basically he says that the fortunate confluence of geological and meteorological forces occurs only in the central plains, that region that historically supported the bison. It is there that food crops produce the highest rate of all nutrients and it is much higher than other regions. For example, just from the wetter eastern kansas to the drier western part protein in wheat was almost double in the 1940 harvest. Western kansas is in that zone that gets just enough rainfall but not too much (though global warming is likely changing that picture rapidly).

Regions that currently or formerly support hardwood forests necessarily have less ideal soils and areas that support coniferous forest are the worst. That goes along with local observation here that fields growing jack-pine are very poor indeed, those places that grow the leguminous locust tree are much better.