There is a new movement sweeping the world leaving fields untilled, ‘green manures’ and other soil-enhancing methods with an almost evangelistic fervor.
Green Manures Are Fast-growing Plants Sown to Cover Bare Soil. Often Used in the Vegetable Garden, Their Foliage Smothers Weeds and Their Roots Prevent Soil Erosion
Soil is the ‘Skin of the Earth’ and the resource which serves as the basis for food security. Repeated plowing exacts a price but nature can heal if we give her the chance.
Soil-conservation farming is gaining converts as growers increasingly face extreme weather, high production costs, a shortage of labor and the threat of government regulation of agricultural pollution. Government surveys suggest that the use of no-tillage farming has grown sharply over the last decade, accounting for about 35 percent of cropland in the United States.
Tillage degrades soil, killing off its biology, including beneficial fungi and earthworms, and leaving it naked, thirsty, hungry and running a fever. Degraded soil requires heavy applications of synthetic fertilizer to produce high yields. And because its structure has broken down, the soil washes away easily in heavy rain, taking nitrogen and other pollutants with it into rivers and streams. Soil health proponents say that by leaving fields unplowed and using cover crops such as ‘green manures’ , which act as sinks for nitrogen and other nutrients, growers can increase the amount of organic matter in their soil, making it better able to absorb and retain water. Each 1 percent increase in soil organic matter helps soil hold 20,000 gallons more water per acre.
Even farmers who enthusiastically adopt no-till and other soil-conservation methods rarely do so for environmental reasons; their motivations are more pragmatic.
No Disruptive Technology Is Required to Restore Soil, Our Forefathers Have the Answer
The value of green manure was recognized by farmers in India for thousands of years, as mentioned in treatises like Vrikshayurveda. In Ancient Greece too, farmers ploughed broad bean plants into the soil. Furthermore, Chinese agricultural texts dating back hundreds of years refer to the importance of grasses and weeds in providing nutrients for farm soil. It was also known to early North American colonists arriving from Europe. Common colonial green manure crops were rye, buckwheat and oats.
One of the toughest things about learning to do no-till is for farmers to unlearn all the things that they thought were true.
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The Sabbath-year rest revisited! God made the earth and He even gave us His Owner’s manual. Read and obey! Thanks for sharing that information. It is a very “down-to-earth article!
Thank you Ephesians 413 for liking this response. This matter concerns all especially some younger generation deprived from practical hands on life skills of fascinating interest in spacial learning. Schools used to compete class by class to win the best produce competition from growing crops to learn organic natural existence. Now with global hitech development in all aspects of life children suffer from Nature Deficit Disorder (NDD). This is a common problem with long-term implications for today’s children.
What is NDD? Education.com explains in Nature Deficit Disorder: The lack of routine contact with nature may result in stunted academic or developmental growth. This unwanted side-effect of the electronic age is called Nature Deficit Disorder (NDD). The term was coined by author Richard Louv in his book Last Child in the Woods in order to explain how our societal disconnect with nature affects today’s children. Louv says we have entered a new era of suburban sprawl that restricts outdoor play, in conjunction with a plugged-in culture that draws kids indoors. But, as Louv presents in his book, the agrarian, nature-oriented existence hard-wired into human brains isn’t quite ready for the overstimulating environment we’ve carved out for ourselves. Some children adapt. Those who don’t develop the symptoms of NDD, which include attention problems, obesity, anxiety, and depression.
Nature-deficit disorder is not a medical condition; it is a description of the human costs of alienation from nature. This alienation damages children and shapes adults, families, and communities. There are solutions, though, and they’re right in our own backyards. Solve this problem to help children learn about beautiful flowers, plant things with them, enjoy nature walks to discuss plants, orchards, fruit trees and birds pots to eat left over apples outside in garden etc. Do this children a favour to help them value the wonderful gift God gave humans. In so doing they exercise through the nature walks, preserve plants, and gain fresh air. Above all helps impact influence and teach them to leave a good legacy, respect for environment and treating the earth as God Wants. Thanks for following God’s HotSpot wordpress. com God bless you
Our Father in Heaven, Almighty God trained farmers in the Bible to use this method to let topsoil heal, recover to remain fallow ground for 7 years. So the land is to be rotated allowing the portion heavily farmed to be restored naturally. God Has Given us all things pertaining to life to enjoy in line with Godly Wisdom. The problem started when mankind abandoned the Godly Sound Advise from God due to greed. In the past whole community tended a local farm and natural organic farming methods were applied. So community was the customers too each buying from the farmers directly in win win situation. However, pretty soon others whispered in the farmer’s ears to get rid of too many people (direct buyers) to use tractors, combine harvestors to cut costs? Worst mistake ever made by humans against Godly use of land in farming. The trees that protected the crops from harsh sunshine had to be cut for machines to move on land. Second big mistake as it caused heavy deforestation and it destroyed natural carbon cycle rainfall patterns. Causing domino effect distorted weather cycle. Soon fertiliser big business plus seed multiplication companies shouted to help save damaged land disturbed by heavy machinery. So sheep and cattle chicken, pigs, etc lost organic grazing land damaged by machinery. So next thing fertilisers used to try to restore original Godly natural soil to preserve and restore land. Impossible! And the greatest joke in history as it did more harm than good, affecting pollen birds bees, food chain so many lost, died or flew further to search for food. Hybrid seeds did not perform naturally on a disturbed land so crops and harvests sufferred too. Since land regarded as investment commodity, do not listen to traditional farmers. Godly ancient tried, tested, reliable, method pushed aside a heavy technology undergirded loans and pesticides did more harm than good. Loans soared as intensive money farming concentrates on profit got worse. Acid rain, ozone destroyed land and planet caused by man-made ideas. Quality of natural tastes of food eroded as replaced by modern generic cardboard bland taste crops. Emerged outrageous quantity of food but now without community to buy all. So food processing, enhancers, bulking agents, factories, supermarket agents joined to help farmers solve problem. Now perfect shape crop produce entered on board insisting on perfect colour, size, shape, impossible and out of the control of farmers. So fields of good food abandoned and rejected for not meeting supermarket insist standards. Led to tons of food buried on landfill or shredded, processed into other use except food for humans. Finally seems mankind has gone full circle to learn the hard way to return to the Godly original method perfectly win win for healthy, delicious tasting food, and to restore carbon cycle, rain cycle etc as God Intended in His Perfect WISDOM. Let us hope those in the boardrooms never farmed before so know nothing about farming stop interfering with the natural Godly method for nature to function as God Ordained. By the way natural nutrient contents of food is lost while toxic chemicals affect the food mostly chaff due to the excessive use of non- natural original fertilser chemicals for profit than healthy food. Thanks following us @ God’sHotSpot wordpress.com. God bless