with his 15-foot-tall sweet corn
grown with Adzsum Plus™
and composted cow manure
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with his 15-foot-tall sweet corn grown with Adzsum Plus™ and composted cow manure |
There is no gain to plant a tree with superior genetics in impoverished soil that is deficient in minerals, depleted of organic matter and devoid of microbial life. Therefore, a priority for tree protection and forest preservation is to research, advocate and promote sensible, natural methods to improve soil fertility.
Soil: foundation for all life on earth
The balance of life on Earth depends on the thin skin of living soil that covers much of the land on most of the planet's continents and islands. Nearly all Earth's land-based organisms—especially trees, shrubs, herbs and grasses—need nutrients supplied by this living layer of dirt and duff. Globally, soil—and the bacteria, insects and plants that live in and on the soil—regulates the balance of moisture, oxygen and heat in our atmosphere, and thus creates climate and maintains the stability of our weather.
On every continent, many soils are worn-out, weak, depleted, deficient, damaged, infertile, even sterile. Some soils—such as western Australia, the Middle East and southern Africa—are already very ancient and aged.
| Forest Soil Improvement
a simple experiment comparative test of four rock powder trace element soil amendments |
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After centuries of increasing pollution and squander, our precious soil resources have reached crisis conditions. Not ony is the acreage of arable farmland shrinking worldwide, but the fertility, tilth and productivity of our remaining soils are deteriorating. All the while, agriculture technology still depends on quick fixes based on petrochemicals and soluble salts as its only sure cure.
Our first task in Earth Restoration must be to revive these worn out soils. Without healthy, balanced, fertile soil able to support lush vegetation and abundant animal life, all our efforts at ecological repair and restoration will fail. We must renew life from the ground up by combining traditional methods of land conservation with new effective technologies to make new topsoil, fertile enough to sustain rapid, intensive restoration of the diversity of biological life—especially grasses and prairies, and trees and forests.
Fortunately, in the last two centuries, many individuals have investigated soil renewal in the past, and left us records of their insights, discoveries and methods.
| Sources
of rock minerals click a link |
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Clodbuster Elemite Nutri-carb |
Pioneers in Soil Renewal
Over and over again, in farming, forestry, horticulture, and laboratories, many pioneers have studied soils to discover the power of minerals and microbes to renew topsoil. Powdered rocks, composts and inoculants—these are the simple, timeless, natural materials these pioneers used to restore fertility, and assure plant vitality. The stories of some of these experimenters and visionaries are told in the articles link-listed below:
Julius Henzel: Over 100 years ago in the 19th century, before the invention of soluble chemical fertilizers, a German farmer founded a movement to spread stone meal on farmland.
Dr. George Earp-Thomas: Early in the 20th century, a research scientist from New Zealand found New Jersey soils were losing minerals, especially trace elements, and learned how to renew their fertility naturally.
James Ruegg: Later in the 20th century, a retired New Jersey engineer used ground-up lava rocks to restore the productivity of a worn-out farm.
Joseph Lionel: In Colorado, a man discovers an ancient mineral spring deposit has the trace elements to make an excellent trace element fertilizer for farmlands, and animal feed supplement.
Dr. Maynard Murray: Begining in 1938 and through the 1950's Dr. Murray demonstratred the effectiveness of sea solids to restore trace elements to topsoil and grow superior crops and healthier animals.
Don Jansen, as Ocean-grown Foods of Fort Myers, has continued Dr. Murray's work with sea solids and hydroponics in south Florida and Haiti
John Hamaker: In the latter half of the 20th century, a retired engineer in Missouri discovered that glacial gravel dust can improve the quantity and quality of yield corn and grains from farmlands.
Tom MacDonald: In the 1980's, an organic farmer in upstate New York discovered the benefits of glacial gravel dust to create an abundance of healthy, disease resistant vegetable crops and lower his fertilizer bills.
Dr. Robert Bruck: In the 1980's, a North Carolina forestry expert conducted experiments that showed rockdust trace element fertilizer can renew dying forests and assure healthy, vigorous seedling growth on southern Appalachian mountaintops deforested by acid rain and air pollution.
Barrie Oldfield: In Western Australia, the President of the Men of the Trees leads research into using granite dust to renew that land's ancient weathered, worn-out soils.
Tom Spereano: In 1997, a Missouri aquafarmer found that the addition of a dime's worth of trace element fertilizer to his hydroponics beds can boost productivity by over 20% to yield several extra dollars of tasty profit.
Jared Milarch: In northwest Michigan, a tree farmer and college student discovered that a few ounces of trace element fertilizer produces bigger, stronger, healthier, faster maturing trees and tomatoes.
Greenhouse Trial
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| Tomatoes on the left
grown with Azomite™ & compost |
Bedrock into Biology
turning sunshine into sugar
To restore topsoil, our first action must be to assure an abundant supply of essential elements. These elements are supplied in the form of "minerals"—complex combinations of chemical elements. Minerals are usually metals combined with oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, other non-metals, and water. These minerals are blended together in crystalline and amorphous forms as the rocks of the Earth.
Soil is made from rocks. Soil is decayed rock. Rocks are weathered and worn by wind and water into dust, grit and sand. The raw, elemental minerals exposed by this breakdown are then digested, reformed and transformed by microbes, algae, lichen and other simple lifeforms. The simplest organisms perform the primary task of transforming minerals into protoplasm.
Plants then combine these carbon-bound soil minerals with sunshine, water and carbon dioxide to create sugars, the universal fuel for biological life. Through the miracle of photosynthesis, magnesium in chlorophyll liberates oxygen and sunshine is captured in carbohydrates. As in the chlorophyll molecule itself, the minerals form the heart of biological cells, and supply the electric charges required to fire nature's chemical reactions.
| Elements in the Human Body | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| element | symbol | atoms |
weight | ORGANIC |
| Hydrogen Oxygen Carbon Nitrogen |
O C N |
26.0 10.0 1.5 |
65.0 18.6 3.2 |
MAJOR |
| Calcium Phosphorus Potassium Sodium Sulfur Chlorine Magnesium |
P K Na S Cl Mg |
.2 .06 .06 .05 .04 .03 |
1.0 .4 .2 .04 .2 .06 |
TRACE |
| Iron Iodine Silicon Flourine Copper Manganese Zinc Selenium Cobalt Molybdenum Chromium Tin Boron Nickel Vanadium |
I Si F Cu Mn Zn Se Co Mo Cr Sn B Ni Va |
.0005 .0000003 [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] |
[na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] [na] |
Rocks are not equal in their ability to provide nutrients. Some rocks consist of only a few elements; others contain a wide diversity of elements. Some rocks contain too many heavy metals, others consist of a wide diversity of trace elements. Some rocks contain an abundance of silica; others consist mainly of clay-forming minerals. Determining what rock might be best to renew which type of soil or soil condition can become complex and fraught with technical uncertainties and unknowns.
| Additional Trace Elements | |
|---|---|
| Antimony | effective against blood flukes |
| Bismuth | efficient Ca & Mg use, bone metabolism, endocrine function, reduces bone calcium loss |
| Cesium | cancer aid, produces alkaline condition |
| Europium | doubles life span of lab animals |
| Germanium | oxygen utilization, enhance immune function, electric impulse initiator |
| Lanthanum | deficiency in chronic fatigue diseases |
| Lithium | ADD, depression, infertility, manic depressn, rages, fits, reduced growth, reproductive failure |
| Neodymium | doubles life span of lab animals, enhanced cell growth |
| Praseodymium | doubles life span of lab animals, enhanced cell growth |
| Samarium | doubles life span of lab animals, enhanced cell proliferation, cancer, hearing loss, male pattern baldness |
| Silver | anti-bacteria, anti-fungal, anti-viral, systemic disinfectant, immune support, subdues inflammation, promote healing |
| Strontium | amino acids, hemoglobin, insulin, adrenal hormone, enzymes, antibodies, connective degeneration, lupus, collagen diseases, sickle cell anemia |
| Thulium | doubles life of lab animals, enhanced cell growth |
| Yttrium | doubles life of lab animals, enhanced cell growth |
There are at least a dozen other elements, beyond the major seven, that science now knows are needed for healthy plants. Many more—such as molybdenum—needed by specialized soil microbes, which fulfill special functions to create soil and fertility, such as synthesizing certain enzymes, vitamins, antibiotics, or other critical biolmolecules. Most are required in extremely tiny amounts—micrograms or less—and thus are called "trace elements."
Most trace elements dissolve into water faster than the major elements. So, in an average soil, trace elements leach out of soils faster than major elements. This removal of trace elements is accelerated by acid rain, soluble chemical fertilizers and excessive tillage. The consequence is that all soils eventually and easily become deficient in minor or trace elements. Continued doses with N-P-K and lime fertilizers will not resolve these deficiencies, and, in fact, will make them worse.
Trace elements play a key role in the function of many enzymes and hormones. One consequence of this is that a very tiny amount trace element has an exceedingly great effect on the healthy function of plants and animals. For example, it is well-known that insuffient iodine will induce goiter, a disease of the thyroid gland. And a deficiency of cobalt will leave us without vitamin B12, and thus unable to manufacture red blood cells. Neither is needed in more than a microgram per day—an amount which will easily fit on the head of a pin.
To supply soil with a balanced, complete sources of these essential elements, certain simple principles apply.
Principle of Proportion
Plants and animals require elements in specific proportions, not simply in specific quantities. Mineral nutrients must be supplied a certain ratios.
This principle was discovered by nearly every scientist who studied the complex roles of minerals and trace elements. Dr. Maynard Murray gave a clear depiction of this: sodium chloride will poison most plants, yet dilute seawater stimulates their growth.
| Bibliography | |
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| Full Length Articles | Short Essays and Sketches |
| Trees, Tomatoes & Trace Elements
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Trace Elements: the Missing Links
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The Principle of Proportion means that the least exert the greatest effect. A tiny amount of a trace element can be more crucial to proper growth and health as a large amount of the major elements. Thus, the least is often the greatest. Fertilizing with N-P-K fertilizers eventually results in soils deficient in trace elements.
Feed the Soil, Not the Plant
Another principle is "Feed the soil, not the plant." Microbes consume and digest minerals, and thus convert them to forms more easily absorbed and used by plants. Conventional agriculture shortcuts this microbial feeding chain by using synthetic chemicals to supply nutrients as soluble salts that are directly absorbed by plant roots. But we now know many bacteria and fungi actually pump nutrients into roots ten times or more faster than soluble salts are absorbed. In return, microbes receive sugars and other carbon compounds secreted by plant roots.
Remineralize the Earth
Journal of the North American Network