First
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| Determine what soil organisms
are present in the soil. Determine which organism groups are missing or
in too low number to benefit the plants in the system. Generally this
means an initial assessment of the whole foodweb to see what is
out-of-balance. |
Second
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| Those organism groups that are
missing should be inoculated back into the soil. Whatever is lacking,
too high, or too low needs to be brought back into balance for the plant
desired. A good diversity of species of that group is required too.
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Third
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| Add food resources for organism
groups low in numbers or biomass. Just like any other living organism,
bacteria, fungi, protozoa, nematodes, microarthropods and roots require
food to stay alive. If it's not present, the organisms either become
dormant or die. For the larger organisms, soil structure must be built
first, since they require living space as well as food. If the soil is
compacted, spaces for the larger organisms have been crushed, and space,
i.e., micro- and macro-aggregates, must be re-built first, or the larger
organisms will have no place to live. Even though you may inoculate them
in a certain place, without space to live, they'll just go someplace
else where there is decent soil structure. Adding the proper food
resources will assist in keeping the soil life in your soil. |
Fourth
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| Check the success of your
microbial management. Once you've done something designed to increase
soil organisms, check and make certain they HAVE been increased. This
means taking samples and repeating the assays that showed missing or low
organism biomass. |
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| Dealing with problem areas.
Most problem areas are prime candidates for using the soil foodweb to
solve the problem, but need more intensive examination than generally
healthy areas. With healthy areas, the desire is to reduce use of
expensive chemical inputs. In areas with problems, more effort will be
needed to get the foodweb back into balance than in areas where just
maintaining existing productivity is desired. It should be noted that
once a healthy foodweb is in place, in most cases, turf health is
increased and fewer problems occur. This is not to say that weather, or
other disturbances, can't knock the foodweb out of balance, but
typically the kinds of disturbances that affect the foodweb this
drastically are infrequent.
Sometimes the "how-to-fix" practices outlined below don't work in
problem areas, because there are chemical residues in the soil. Nearly
any residue can eventually be decomposed by soil organisms, but it can
be a challenge to find the right set of conditions to encourage the
right organisms to work on the toxic material. However, until that toxin
is removed, production in that area will always be a problem, so the
sooner the search for the proper organism to degrade that material is
begun, the sooner the toxin can be removed. |
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