Quote:
Originally Posted by Michaelangelica
I think PAUL E. STAMETS has a useful-mushroom spore selling business.
i just read his catalogue and drooled.
Not a legal import into Oz.
It has belatedly dawned on me that the water holding propertied of char are due to the build up in the soil of microrganisms; not the char itself. IOW it is a catalyst for enabling soil microbiology and therefore water retention in the soil.
I guess Australia's problem is that we need some water first, otherwise nothing lives.
While one can't sell charcoal as a replacement for the dangerous, useless and toxic "water holding crystals" charcoal will eventually do a better job over time (12 months? + organic matter, compost tea, or sugar?)
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I believe it's both the char and the microbes in it. Remember biochar isn't quite the same as activated charcoal, in that it still has complex chemical residues in it, perhaps comprised of oils, acidic and tannin-type compounds which are hydrophilic and will attract and hold water, and the fact that some portion of the charcoal may oxidize and age, becoming more water and nutrient friendly. And charcoal simply has surprising surface area. Something like 400 sq meters or more worth of surface area per gram. Of course, microbes are made up to a greater or lesser extent by water, and when you combine charcoal's great affinity for water + its ability to hold and promote living things that contain water, you have one of nature's best sponges bar none, IMO.
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Teach a Wall Street banker how to build a fire and he'll be warm for the night. Set a Wall Street banker on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
Logic
The art of thinking and reasoning in strict accordance with the limitations and incapacities of the human misunderstanding.
--Ambrose Bierce,
The Devil's Dictionary
