pnw-farmer
Well-known member
There is a lot of good info on the net on that subject of soil health. Ray A. Gabe B. Dr Elaines soil food web.I have been talking with organic gardeners who do things on scale about alternative fertilize options.
They've talked fermenting organic materials, compost teas, some other stuff too. There are other options out there. Just a matter of trying something new and scaling them up. Folks are having some success in doing this.
Found a very knowledgeable young man that just moved here from AZ. Going to get him to help me treat a 25 acre hay lease we have. See how it goes.
I think we need to start looking at biological fixes/corrections though. Animals need to be put back on hay/crop ground for their impact. Feed hay back onto the hayfields. Organic matter is everything I do believe.
I started planting multispecies cover crops. Legumes to capture N, turnips for compaction. cereal rye.
Main goal is to try and graze year around or at least 10 months a year and build soil heath.
Will see how it works out, it is a process but with fertilizer prices the way they are. Plus adding N fertilizer lowers PH which leads to more lime which cost more.