Terra Preta - The parent thread which started it all

[Ganoderma]

you mean plants, right?

[Michaelangelica]

Originally Posted by Ganoderma

you mean plants, right?

"que?"
(Manuel, Faulty Towers)

[Ganoderma]

"Most Australian natives cannot now re-produce without fire of some kind."

annnnnyway.....

wood is not as plentiful here as it was in Canada, so I am trying with burnt bamboo I got myself a bunch of worms the other day to feed some bugs so I thought I would spare them, temporarily anyway, and place them in the compost (the heavy rains here keep killing them in my un-drained compost buckets )

Those eco ovens sound pretty interesting! With temp sup into the high 30s here I think this may be a fun experiment. I would like to hear how you peoples contraptions are going.

[Michaelangelica]

Originally Posted by Ganoderma

"Most Australian natives cannot now re-produce without fire of some kind."

O!
O dear!
LOL

annnnnyway.....

[QUOTE=Ganoderma]wood is not as plentiful here as it was in Canada, so I am trying with burnt bamboo
The charcoal I am using comes from Malaysia. I am certain it is made from bamboo It is "redhead" brand and too expensive at $6.95 for 3.5 kilo
I still have to work up the courage to ask for the (charcoal) scraps at my local Charcoal Chicken Shop

[Michaelangelica]

Yet another article
http://www.anthonares.net/2006/07/te...inability.html

From this knowledge, researchers have begun to speculate as to what fraction of the Amazon basin is truly wilderness. Their results, though highly speculative, are startling. One widely-cited estimate is that 11.8 percent of the non-flooded Amazon forest is man-made. In other words, about an eighth of the dryland Amazon is orchard.

[Ganoderma]

i dont have any numbers to back it up so maybe i shouldnt speak but i dont think that 11.8% is too much relative to other countries. from travelling i would say that taiwan is probably triple that in just farms. i would bet that half the country is developed...

the worse part is those dont count animal land. i am sure many countries, asian, aus, american, african would be an extremely high percent in farms. but we got to eat. with terra pretta i dont know how bad a thing that many orchardes would be there....aside from less of a carbon sink.

[Michaelangelica]

Originally Posted by Ganoderma

i dont have any numbers to back it up so maybe i shouldnt speak but i dont think that 11.8% is too much relative to other countries. from travelling i would say that taiwan is probably triple that in just farms. i would bet that half the country is developed...

the worse part is those dont count animal land. i am sure many countries, asian, aus, american, african would be an extremely high percent in farms. but we got to eat. with terra pretta i dont know how bad a thing that many orchardes would be there....aside from less of a carbon sink.

I think the idea was that the Amazon was thought of as an "untouched 'wilderness' ".
It is only archeology has shown that this may not be the case (in pre 1500 societies)
see:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/horizon...adotrans.shtmlhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/science/horizon...adotrans.shtml which started the whole conversation going !

[Michaelangelica]

http://www.newfarm.org/columns/resea...charcoal.shtml

Dr. Paul's Research Perspectives

Soil erosion, energy scarcity, excess greenhouse gas
all answered through regenerative carbon management
Compost is great, but new bio-based process yields hydrogen and super-stable carbon as charcoal soil booster.

By Paul Hepperly

editors' NOTE:

As New Farm Research and Training Manager at The Rodale Institute®, Dr. Paul Hepperly has been a regular contributor to NewFarm.org for some time, providing research updates, op-ed pieces, and white papers on topics like carbon sequestration in organic farming systems.
Dr. Paul Hepperly

None of those venues do full justice to the range of Paul's experience, however. Paul grew up on a family farm in Illinois and holds a Ph.D. in plant pathology, an M.S. in agronomy and a B.S. in psychology from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana.
He has worked for the USDA Agricultural Research Service, in academia, and for a number of private seed companies, including Asgrow, Pioneer, and DeKalb. He has overseen research in Hawaii, Iowa, Puerto Rico, and Chile, and investigated such diverse crops as soybeans, corn, sorghum, sunflowers, ginger, and papaya.
He has witnessed the move toward biotech among the traditional plant breeding community and the move toward organics among new wave of upcoming young farmers. Beford coming to the Rodale Institute Paul worked with hill farmers in India to help them overcome problems with ginger root rot in collaboration with Winrock International.

Now we've decided to give Paul his own column, in which he can report on agricultural research from around the world and reflect on its relevance to The Rodale Institute's research program and to the progress of sustainable agriculture more generally in light of his own broad perspective. Enjoy.


Posted January 12, 2006: According to the humorist Will Rogers during the heart of the great depression and dust bowl

“We keep makin’ people but we ain’t makin’ any new dirt!”

In the intervening 70 years we’ve gained more people and lost more “dirt,” despite improvement in soil conservation. Now comes word that we may be on the verge of finally being able to do what Rogers thought was impossible.

The Rodale Institute Farming Systems Trial® (FST), a long-term study comparing different farming systems, shows that we can gain about 1,000 pounds of carbon per acre per year with cover cropping and crop rotation under organic management.
This is about twice the sustained carbon gain from standard no-till planting for corn or soybeans. FST shows insignificant amounts of carbon are deposited in our conventional tillage corn and soybean rotations with chemical fertilizer and pesticide inputs.

biomass-based system can reach sufficient scale and scope, farms and farmers can be our next energy providers while gaining the materials which will regenerate the soil while growing more crops.

Recent research1 shows the process produced three times the hydrogen it consumes, making it a net energy producer.
Further it yielded a nitrogen-enriched char-type fertilizer. This material is highly resistant to microbiological decomposition while also acting as a biological stimulant by providing the “house” for microbial life.

[erich]

I love how searchable this Blackwell Synergy site is,

here are the results from "Terra Preta soils" search:

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/act...rchbutton.y=12

And Their Home page: http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/

Erich

[Michaelangelica]

Originally Posted by erich

I love how searchable this Blackwell Synergy site is,

here are the results from "Terra Preta soils" search:

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/act...rchbutton.y=12

And Their Home page: http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/

Erich

Thanks, lots and lots to read there. I have agoogle alert going for Terra preta and it didn't pick up any of those articles.

This one was interesting

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Effects of the application of charred bark of Acacia mangium on the yield of maize, cowpea and peanut, and soil chemical properties in South Sumatra, Indonesia

Masahide YAMATO1, Yasuyuki OKIMORI1, Irhas Fredy WIBOWO2, Saifuddin ANSHORI2 and Makoto OGAWA3
Abstract

Charred bark of Acacia mangium (bark charcoal), which is made of wood waste from pulp production, was applied as soil amendment for the cultivation of maize, cowpea and peanut to examine its effects on crop yield and soil chemical properties in South Sumatra, Indonesia.
The yields of maize and peanut significantly increased after the application of bark charcoal under a fertilized condition in an infertile soil environment.
In addition, increases in the root amount and colonization rate of arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi after bark charcoal application were also observed in maize.
In general, the application of bark charcoal induced changes in soil chemical properties by increasing the pH value, total N and available P2O5 contents, cation exchange capacity, amounts of exchangeable cations and base saturation, and by decreasing the content of exchangeable Al3+.
The amelioration of the soil chemical properties could be effective in highly weathered infertile tropical soils.
The application of charcoal in agriculture is expected to lead to the formation of a carbon sink in soil and to increase crop yield because it has been suggested that charcoal is highly resistant to abiotic and biotic degradation, even in a soil environment.

I wonder if the increase in soil PH was due to charcoal or wood-ash by-products of charcoal production?