The Future of Our Food
Modern agriculture is a system on trial. The jury is due back...
The good news is that the future of our food has likely been unlocked by a researcher in New Mexico who is creating lushness in the desert. The path away from synthetics and back to natural fertility — thus productivity—likely leads through this researcher’s understanding.
The following was originally published in my newsletter, THE LIVING AG REPORT on March 15, 2018. It is written for the agriculturally and scientifically initiated.
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David Johnson of New Mexico State University wets yard waste before placing into his compost “bioreactor.” In roughly six months, the compost yielded will have immediate impact on fertility and performance where applied.
Four years ago, David Johnson’s research began redefining soil-plant fertility. Who knows it?
I’m embarrassed to admit it: I first learned of Johnson’s findings more than four months ago, amid a flood of other information, and most of his findings flew past me. I caught one bit of it back then, that the most limiting factor in germination and early plant health is soils’ fungal-to-bacterial ratio. That fact alone is tremendous — it changes everything about our perceptions of getting crops out of the ground, but how Johnson learned it opens up an entirely new world of growing things.
Before continuing, let’s take a moment to think about what I wrote above: the most limiting factor in early plant health is fungus compared to bacteria in the soil. Not nitrogen, not organic matter, not phosphorus, not any mineral. Just fungal-to-bacterial ratio. I’m not saying throw away your precision corn meters, but I am saying we can make those meters much less important. The chart on the right shows correlation of plant response to F:B ratio. If I remember my statistics lessons, the other four charts represent insignificant or non-correlated relationships.
Bear with me, I’m trying to warm you up slowly. I don’t want you so excited that you don’t finish reading this email. This is the most important farming news since genetics, even though Johnson’s research is a relative secret.
It all started when David Johnson tasked himself with creating a composting system that wouldn’t involve turning or unpleasant scent. The “Johnson-Su Composting Bioreactor” was born (25 min video explains bioreactor
Johnson began applying the compost directly to the soil at 400 to 500 lbs per acre. That biologically enhanced agricultural management, or “BEAM” approach, showed promise but was quickly surpassed by inoculating seeds and wet-seeding (21 min. video
These inoculants aren’t your run-of-the-seed-shed seed treatments. In fact, today’s fungicidal and insecticidal treatments are counterproductive to making use of spore-laden compost extract made from Johnson-Su compost. By this time we know that tillage is counterproductive to building healthy, fungal dominant soil. Another tool that gets in the way? Glyphosate. First registered as an antimicrobial, glyphosate at 1/100 rate can wipe out 50% of soil fungi (per Johnson citing research).
Once I began to wrap my head around the research, showing that this high quality compost is tripling (or more) the biomass production of our current systems, I knew I had to dive in. I finished my first bioreactor this week. Weather, worms, and maintenance willing, compost will be ready to treat cover crop seed sometime this fall.
Below, Johnson stands with a legume/oat cover of 7,860 pounds per acre. Notice the N content of the above ground biomass, assumed to be the same as below.
Manure + tree leaves + straw + time + water + worms = 4 tons biomass. That’s only the beginning.
The videos linked above are well worth the time. I think they’ll pay you back one million times.
