paleorthid's Feed

transect points: Teaming with Microbes Arrived Today

paleorthid — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 10:36:00 -0500

"Teaming with Microbes", by Jeff Lowenfels and Wayne Lewis. Foreword by Elaine Ingham. Strong soil science orientation. Well organized. Extensive index. Valuable guide to labs and suppliers. Looking forward to actually reading it. Tagged by paleorthid under bacteria, book, review, environment, fertility, fungi, garden, glomalin, microbiology, new, organic, science, soil,

transect points: The Scoop on Dirt (A Review)

paleorthid — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 01:51:00 -0500

Soil scientist takes issue with a beautifully written journalistic essay on soil and soil erosion. He points to two scientific discoveries, terra preta and glomalin, relevant to regenerating damaged soils in the Third World. Tagged by paleorthid under environment, erosion, news, soil, science,

transect points: Black Earth

paleorthid — Wed, 03 Jan 2007 11:31:00 -0500

Peak Energy has a long post on Terra Preta that brings together what has been established on the subject. As of yet, there is no direct mention of the role of glomalin , just a minor mention of the mutualistic fungi that produce it. Glomalin is an unvalidated factor in Terra Preta formation that several of us sense will be demonstrated by soil research as fundamentally important. Spurred on by back40, I am fascinated with bio-char, Terra Preta's key soil amendment. Last summer I constructed a small charcoal retort out of a cracker tin. I used it to produce small pilot batches of low temperature charcoal. Hoping to transform my simple charcoal into a reasonably bio-char-like material, I am currently composting my bits. Tagged by paleorthid under terra_preta, bio-char, soil_science, blog, fungi, glomalin,