Hit The Brix

[The Dude]

Cant wait to watch this later on.Thanks bro!!!Im not as think as you dumb I am.LMAO!Er maybe I is...lol

 

[sniper]

Was wondering if anyone has tried the Grow More Mendocino Honey Natural Sweet Carbohydrate that was mentioned early in the thread .....this is deep,i woke up this morning looking for a good read .....be careful for what you wish for.......lol......my dad always told me if your the smartest guy in the room you need to find a room where your the dumpest guy thats how you learn...... lol something like that...

i haven't tried it yet but i do use the grow more seagrow veg and the bloom and i have no doubt that the mendo honey is good stuff

 

[CGR]

thank you sniper i think IL try it....next grow

 

[CGR]

Wow now thats what I call a seriously serious read.I wsihed I didnt have a headache.The first page was truly amazing,Thank you muchly for this information.C-Ray for all you do and your work put into this I thank you ever so much.JM Thank you!!I cannot wait to finish this up tomm..

:smokebuds: the dude said it all ...................thank you guys

 

[CGR]

JM.........Spearhead is the man........thank you for reminding me about him it made my day ...had my whole fam singing and dancing ............:group::grat::group::bone:

 

[JM]

Yeah man!!! Spearhead rocks!!!

"Love is da Shit that makes life grow... you never know when you might step in it."

 

[JM]

from http://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/p...ch/032954.html (talking about adding woodchips to a compost pile)

Higher carbon content will make it more fungal dominated, esp if that includes woodchips. Also letting it cure for longer after it has cooled down. You can keep a separate pile of woodchips which you inoculate with fungi mycelia that you pick up from healthy forests or orchards that can help you keep a good supply of fungi around, and you can add some of that to the compost after the hot period. (At my house, that's actually the mulch paths).


great video.. we learn something new everyday!

The story, planting, winemaking and expanding of the densest vineyard in the world. The idea and the reason as the results of this new way of making wine.





Bacteria prefer higher nitrogen conditions, and more thoroughly mixed ingredients (fungi can get the right c:n ratio by harvesting from different parts in the pile, whereas bacteria are stuck with what's in front of them).

Fungi (except yeast) die in anaerobic conditions so you need to keep aerobic (but you want to do that in both cases anyway so go get good aerobic bacteria). Most commercial compost I see has little or no fungi because it has gone anaerobic in making.

[video=youtube;dRum805csnE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=dRum805csnE[/video]



from http://montysbiodynamicbasecamp.blog...asons-for.html

Biodynamics – five reasons for

Jessica Standing, Secretary of the Biodynamic Association (BDA) in the UK (contact details below), asked me to come up with five good reasons for Biodynamics, and this is what I wrote:

1) Biodynamics teaches farmers to be more self-reliant, minimising potentially harmful inputs like man-made sprays, saving money and making for safer farms and communities

2) Biodynamics emphasises real self-sufficiency, creating food/wine which tastes of a unique sense of place because Biodynamic farmers have to put more in to the land than they take out

3) Biodynamics re-connects our farms, our farmers, our food and thus us to the kind of seasonal cycles and natural rhythms that our 24-hour culture obliterates

4) Biodynamics is the only farming system which sets out explicitly to produce food which stimulates both body and soul, vital for sentient beings like us

5) Biodynamic techniques like composting, making herb/mineral teas, and working to celestial cycles are cheap, safe, common-sensical and easily applicable to any farm, field or back garden. Biodynamics is neither patented nor trademarked, and so is thus available to everyone. Biodynamics can be learnt quickly and universally: by kids, pensioners and everyone in-between. Biodynamics is a think-local farming system that is cost-effective, produces high quality food, is inherently sustainable, and works.

I don’t expect everyone who reads the above to agree with it, but I hope it is food for thought, whichever side of the farming fence your loyalties lie.

 

[JM]

from http://montysbiodynamicbasecamp.blog...now-about.html

Everything you needed to know about Maria Thun's Barrel Compost

Source: Biodynamic Wine-growing: Theory & Practice which is
on Kindle
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Monty-Waldin...8109499&sr=1-1

in paperback
http://www.lulu.com/shop/monty-waldi...-20231020.html

Barrel compost is simply a quick form of solid biodynamic compost 502-507 which is applied to the soil but in much smaller volumes and in spray form.

Barrel compost is an economical and speedy way of getting the compost preparations 502-507 on the land, biodynamic compost often being at a premium, especially when treating new land or converting a new farm to biodynamic management, where there may be no compost available to spread.[1]

Barrel compost is often the first tool used by wine-growers converting to biodynamics, allowing vineyards to receive their first set of biodynamic compost preparations 502-507 within a matter of weeks, rather the 6-12 months compost piles need to mature.

Barrel compost was developed in the early 1970s in her native Germany by Maria Thun (see Chapter 7).[2] Its precursor was the ‘collective preparation’ or Sammelprepärat developed in 1927 by MK Schwarz, one of the first German farmers to adopt Rudolf Steiner’s biodynamic ideas. Schwarz made his collective or ‘birch pit’ preparation by lining a long pit dug into the ground with birch poles and locating it near the barn in which farm animals overwintered. Their manure was emptied into the pit and the biodynamic compost preparations 502-507 were dropped in. The manure was left to compost for several months and then spread on the farm in solid form, and the pit was re-filled with fresh manure.

Rudolf Steiner made no reference either to barrel compost or a collective/birch pit preparation in his 1924 Agriculture course; and while barrel compost compensates to a degree for a lack of sufficient compost, spraying barrel compost has never been seen as a long-term substitute for solid biodynamic compost 502-507. The latter imparts a more profound, longer-lasting effect to the soil as far as the forces exerted by the compost preparations 502-507 are concerned.[3] This is why the barrel compost spray 502-507 and solid biodynamic compost 502-507 are best used in tandem. Making a pile of compost and omitting to add the biodynamic compost preparations 502-507 to that pile because one is also spraying barrel compost 502-507 would be considered an undesirable and unnecessary short-cut.

Given its German origins it is not surprising Maria Thun’s barrel compost is especially popular with German-speaking wine-growers who call it Pfladenpräparat (‘cow pat preparation’). In France it is called le compost de bouse or simply le Maria Thun. In Australasia a variation developed by Peter Proctor made in a brick pit rather than in a barrel and called the Cow Pat Pit or CPP for short is a popular variation on Thun’s design (both are described in detail, below). Other names for this preparation include barrel prep, barrel manure, biodynamic compound prep or BC, dung compost spray, compost spray prep, manure concentrate.

Maria Thun said spraying barrel compost 502-507 had an enlivening effect on the soil, stimulating the soil metabolism by activating soil micro-organisms which results in better decomposition of organic matter, improved soil structure (less compaction), higher humus levels (balanced soil nutrients), and generally improved soil quality. For those converting to biodynamics after a period of conventional farming barrel compost 502-507 is regarded as being a useful primer for the soil’s very first application of horn manure 500, initiating healing processes for soils damaged by chemical spray residues and reversing the erosive, hardening tendency soluble fertilizers have of turning clay (aluminium silicate) back towards rock.[4]

Making Maria Thun’s Barrel Compost 502-507

Maria Thun made her barrel compost by placing fifty litres of cow dung (same criteria as for horn manure 500), five-hundred grammes of basalt grains or powder (basalt can easily be added as grit) and one-hundred grammes of finely crushed, dried eggshells in a container, like a barrel stood on one end with the other knocked out. Lovel[5] suggests cleaning the barrel by filling it brimful with water, “throwing in a shovel full of compost and stirring. After soaking it for a week, I emptied it out and scrubbed its charred interior with a steel wire brush and wood ashes. Then I filled it again and let it set, throwing in a large bunch of fresh stinging nettles. When this began to smell really rank, I used this nettle tea to water tomato plants and rinsed the barrel out well. I covered it to shade the interior and waited until a pale violet fungus grew on the inside walls. According to Maria Thun this indicates it is ready for use.”

Once inside the barrel the ingredients (cow manure, egg-shells, basalt) are stirred from the outside in for one hour, after which Thun says the mixture should have become “one dynamic whole”, resembling a big cow pat with a slightly dilute colour. Peter Proctor says farmers can become bored during the mixing or stirring and not mix as well or long as required, but a good stirring will “make all the difference” to this preparation's quality. Some find mixing the ingredients easier in a wheel barrow than in a barrel. Others say a cement mixer is easier still...

Half of the manure, basalt, and eggshell mixture is then placed in another barrel stood on one end, but with both ends knocked out. This would have previously been dug into a hole in the ground, not quite half as deep as the barrel, with the excavated earth piled around the part of the barrel poking up above ground level. The barrel is left open at both ends so the contents within may receive both earthly (lime/calcium) and celestial (silica) forces. The five solid biodynamic compost preparations 502-506 are inserted one by one and separately into the mixture, with stinging nettle 504 usually placed at the centre. Then the remaining half of the manure, basalt and eggshell mixture is placed on top, and it too has a set of solid compost preparations inserted. Finally, a liquid mixture made from five drops of the valerian 507 preparation stirred for 10 minutes in a litre of water is poured over the top.[6] The barrel is then covered with its lid.

Barrel compost is prepared under a descending moon and when the sidereal moon stands in a root/earth constellation: Virgin in the northern hemisphere and either Goat or Bull in the southern hemisphere. When the descending, sidereal moon has returned to the same earth/root sign, twenty seven days or one sidereal month after the barrel was first filled with the barrel compost, the contents of the barrel are aired by turning briefly with a spade.

Thun says that after another two weeks the barrel compost will be ready. Bouchet says to wait another 27-day sidereal month. Some New Zealanders leave their barrel compost in the barrel for six to eight months, and even upto one year for it to experience all four seasons.[7] Leaving the finished preparation in situ risks allowing worms to devour it, however.

The finished preparation should resemble very rich, dark, fine soil with a clean, intensely earthy smell. It is stored in the same way as horn manure 500.

The Role of Eggshells & Basalt

Thun decided to add calcium-rich eggshells to her barrel compost because data from a research station in Freiburg (Baden region, Germany) indicated that oats, celery and tomatoes grown on limestone soils contained fewer residues of Strontium 90, a radioactive substance released by nuclear fission (which these plants tend to collect and left by America’s 1958 atomic bomb tests) compared to similar plants grown on sandy (siliceous) granitic soils. After the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986 the German Ministry of Agriculture participated in field trials with Maria Thun which compared perennial rye grass grown in Uranium-contaminated soil containing solid barrel compost 502-507 (15 grammes per kilo of soil) or merely sprayed with barrel compost (36 grammes of spray per kilo of soil) compared to plants in soil treated only with commercial fertilizer.

Plants in all three soils grew more fine root hairs and produced about 30% more roots than normal. However the green shoots of the biodynamic plants contained an average 55% lower levels of Uranium. This suggests Maria Thun’s barrel compost 502-507 helps to reduce the transfer of Uranium ions from the soil to the aerial part of the plant.[8] It also suggested that the negative effect radioactivity has on the capacity of plant roots to take up nutrients that otherwise would be impeded by the radioactivity in the soil is diminished in the presence of barrel compost. Biodynamic wine-growers are therefore encouraged to keep chickens from which to source fresh eggshells for this part of the preparation.[9]

Grinding the eggshells and calcium is said to allow micro-organisims in the manure a greater chance of breaking the minerals down, using some for their own nutrition, but excreting some in water-soluble form. The calcium element in this preparation is also thought to combat the effects of acid rain by stimulating calcium processes which help regulate soil pH.[10]

Thun says basalt’s role is to support those living organisms and processes in the soil involved in or which work towards decomposition, and thus promotes microbial activity in the soil and ultimately humus formation there. (Basalt can be spread directly on a garden to help the humus formation in clay soils, clay particles binding with humus to hold soil nutrients, preventing erosion of them.)[11] Henderson[12] points out that in chemical terms this leads to the formation of more clay-minerals, which encourage humus formation (clay-humus complex). The basalt acts in a nitrogen-fixing capacity when even more finely ground than grit, she says.

Another way of looking at the addition of eggshell (calcium) and basalt is that they represent two basic soil types. Basalt comes from inert magma within the earth’s mantle and amounts to embryonic, new soil[13], like infant clay.[14] Basalt is a young igneous rock formation originating from deep down in the earth’s crust. Brought to the surface through volcanic activity, the flowing lava cools rapidly to a very dark and dense rock whilst being exposed to the sun in its molten state, giving basalt a sun impregnated formative quality. It became in effect a rock formed not just by the forces of the earth but those of the cosmos too. This is why according to Maria Thun basalt is so beneficial as an ingredient of barrel preparation.[15]

Calcium in contrast is a geological baby present in limestone-rich soils formed by marine deposits from living creatures within the last several hundred million years. From a biodynamic perspective the eggshells provide the lime polarity (formative forces regulating crop growth)[16] while basalt provides the balancing silica polarity (formative forces regulating crop taste).

Christian von Wistinghausen used volcanic ash instead of eggshells for his version of Maria Thun’s barrel compost, Der Mäusdorfer Rottelenker which he named after his home town of Mäusdorf and which directed the breakdown or decompostion of matter. He blended basalt dust (from below the ground) with ground lava (from above the ground) in cow manure which is forked over every three weeks, each time with a set of compost preparations 502-507 inserted. When the mixture was ready it is dried and crumbled up. Von Wistinghausen advises this be made in large amounts, twenty barrow loads at a time.

Peter Proctor’s Cow Pat Pit (CPP) Spray 502-507

Peter Proctor called his version of Maria Thun’s barrel compost the cow pat pit or cow pat prep (“CPP”). This is because a shallow pit or trench about 90cm long by 60cm wide and 30cm deep (3 feet by 2 feet by 1 foot) is used rather than in a barrel. Proctor found “making barrel compost problematic because it is slow, and hard to get the preparation out of the barrel when it is ready; and the preparation can smell because it has gone anaerobic in the barrel. I find it easier to make the preparation in a pit lined on all four sides by old bricks. These adsorb moisture but keep the dung cool, while stopping it from drying out.”


Peter Proctor and his Cow Pat Prep brick pits, 10th Feb 2004

Proctor lays the dung to a depth of 10-12cm (4 to 5 inches). “Any deeper and the transformation process will take too long. It should take about two months,” he says.[17] He lines the pit with the cow dung together with 200 grammes of powdered eggshell for the calcium influence and 200 grammes of basalt dust for the silica influence.[18] “These are first mixed together for 15-30 minutes in your hand,” he says “rather as you would mix dough, with a sort of flipping motion. Put the mixture into the pit and pat it down, but pat lightly, as you do not want to overly compact the mixture. It should be level. Then add 1-3 grammes of the solid biodynamic compost preparations [502-506]. Then potentize [stir] the valerian compost preparation [507] in the usual way and sprinkle over the cow pat mixture.[19] Then spread a damp hessian sack or gunny bag over the top. You should lay the brick pit in a shady place to keep it cool by allowing a good air flow in hot weather, to stop it from getting wet from rain, and to keep it sheltered in cold weather. The aim is to achieve a constant temperature and humidity. So in dry weather you can sprinkle the bricks with water every two or three days to keep them damp and to maintain humidity. After 6 weeks turn the preparation with a garden fork. If the dung has not broken down add another set of compost preparations. The dung should lose its smell. You will see decomposition begins at the edges of the pit where air flow is greatest.”


Figure 1A variation combining Maria Thun's barrel-shaped container but made of bricks which Peter Proctor favours over barrel oak for improved airflow as demonstrated by Jeremiah Courtney of the Josephine Porter Institute for Applied Bio-Dynamics, USA

Spraying Barrel Compost/Cow Pat Pit 502-507

Before being sprayed on the land barrel compost/CPP is diluted in clean rain water and dynamised (stirred) for twenty minutes, rather than for a full hour which is the case for the two biodynamic horn preparations 500 and 501. Thun says this is because the manure in the barrel compost/CPP has already been stirred for one hour when being mixed with the eggshells and basalt, so only 20 minutes of stirring is needed when the finished preparation is diluted in water prior to spraying. If the compost preparations 502-507 already present within barrel compost/CPP were to be dynamised for another full hour certain beneficial processes risk being inverted, such as barrel compost’s anti-cryptogamic effect.[20]

Barrel compost is stirred for 20 minutes before being sprayed on the ground

For one hectare Thun mixes 240 grammes of her barrel compost in 40 litres of water. The diluted preparation is applied as a fine spray on the soil. Whereas horn manure 500 should be sprayed within four hours of being dynamised, Thun maintained that because barrel compost’s ingredients are pre-stirred for one hour whilst being prepared this pre-potentizing process permits barrel compost to retain its effectiveness for up to 4 days after stirring even though it is only stirred for 20 minutes.[21] Hence Christian von Wistinghausen recommended three sprayings over 1-2 days from the same stirring.

For one hectare Proctor dilutes 2.5kg of his CPP preparation in 112 litres of water, over ten times as much solid material as Thun, probably because Proctor’s main consulting work was with Indian farmers with parched, easily eroded soils. The much more concentrated dilution means Proctor’s CPP acts almost as a liquid soil manure, or manure concentrate.[22]

Like horn manure 500, barrel compost/CPP 502-507 is most effective when sprayed in the afternoon, during humid, rather than dry weather for better integration into the soil. Ideally it is sprayed in autumn and under a descending moon when the earth inwardly inhales. Peter Proctor advised his cow pat pit is best sprayed for the first time early in the second quarter on a earth/root period, and during a descending moon phase as the earth breathes in, before horn manure 500 is sprayed. In other circumstances it is best applied at the end of the third quarter and the beginning of the fourth. At this time the formative forces and the water forces are at their peak in the soil.

Advice as to how often barrel compost 502-507 should be sprayed varies. One school says “barrel preparation can be used as frequently as you like. Because of requiring only twenty minutes stirring it can be used as a regular treatment of soil compost and stock yards to activate humus forming processes.”[23] Another says “it is not recommended to spray barrel compost more than once or twice a year, even on fields which need all the compost preparations [502-507], because continual use of barrel compost results in an accumulation of forces which ultimately will throw the field out of balance, a limitation of this particular preparation.”[24]

Peter Proctor told me he felt the cow pat pit (CPP) was severely under-utilised in biodynamic farming, meaning it should be used regularly on the soil or crops and in combination with the three other biodynamic field sprays horn manure 500, horn silica 501, and common horsetail (Equisetum arvense) 508, and biodynamic compost 502-507. The danger of barrel compost/CPP 502-507 throwing a field out of balance would arise only if this preparation was being continually and on its own.

Mixing barrel compost/CPP 502-507 with horn manure 500 to save spraying time may weaken the effect of both, and risks creating the same opposition of forces potentially present in prepared horn manure 500 + 502-507. This is why Bouchet[25] advises leaving a three week gap between spraying horn manure 500 and barrel compost 502-507 (see also Winter Tree or Pruning Paste/Wash, below). Proctor advises waiting at least two days after spraying CPP 502-507 before spraying either horn manure 500 or horn silica 501. However, farmers may still mix these two sprays for expediency, to have one stirring-and-spraying event instead of two, even though there could be an opposition between the growth forces contained in the horn manure 500 and the decomposition forces contained in the compost preparations 502-507.

Hugh Courtney[26] says “a field receiving treatment for the first time probably should have separate application of the B.C. [barrel compost] and #500 [horn manure], but that thereafter, if time constraints dictate, the two could be combined. This is based on my perception that although you are dealing with different forces in the different preparations, they are not incompatible with each other especially in a situation where they are already all at work together.”

Henderson[27] however says it is common practice in New Zealand, in India (advised by Peter Proctor), Germany and Switzerland, especially on larger farming operations, for barrel compost 502-507 to be added to a stirring of horn manure 500, to save an extra trip onto the land with the tractor or sprayer. In this case it is added to the final twenty minutes of the hour-long stirring for horn manure 500.

Effects of Barrel Compost/Cow Pat Pit 502-507

Barrel compost/CPP’s role is to activate soil organisms when soil activity needs to be encouraged, while also improving soil structure. Thus it is commonly sprayed on freshly ploughed soil or on soil (recently grazed pasture or pasture recently mowed for hay, for example) about to be ploughed, usually either in autumn or spring when compost or green manures (cover crops) are being turned in.[28] Spraying barrel compost in autumn is considered ideal as this is when the earth goes to sleep and inhales (see also horn manure 500). Autumn sprayings of barrel compost/CPP stimulate soil microbes just as the vine roots they often colonise become active and fill with carbohydrates from the previous year’s vine growth, the very food these microbes not only need but have been waiting for. A follow-up application of barrel compost/CPP in spring is seen to bring to a close the winter process of decomposition underground. By budburst in spring soil organisms should have finished decomposing compost, cover crops, fallen leaves or vine prunings left between the vine rows. If this process is incomplete then vines may struggle to find the soil nitrogen they need for bud burst and new shoot growth.

Other uses of Barrel Compost/Cow Pat Pit 502-507

Barrel compost/CPP can be added to effluent ponds before refilling instead of the biodynamic compost preparations 502-507 to reduce smell and aid decomposition (farmers may find it easier to add a few handfuls of cow pat pit than to fiddle with individual compost preparations). Barrel compost/CPP combined with plant-based liquid manures, typically comfrey, stinging nettle, Equisetum arvense (common horsetail) 508, can be sprayed on the soil, or as a foliar feed on crops with an additional anti-fungal effect provided by the cow manure. Barrel compost/CCP can be added to heaps of manure or other material intended for composting before a proper compost heap is made.[29] Plants grown in potting mixes come on earlier if barrel compost/CPP is added. The root balls of young vines can be sprayed with barrel compost/CPP just before they are planted. Barrel compost/CPP can also be used as a seed bath. Barrel compost/CPP is also useful for application when plants and soils are under stress from insect attack, drought, etc.

[1] Lovel, Hugh., A Biodynamic Farm (Acres USA, 2000), p.122
[2] See Thun, Maria., Work on the Land and the Constellations (Lanthorn Press, 1979)
[3] Courtney, Hugh., ‘A JPI Perspective on Biodynamics', Applied Biodynamics 1/1992, p3.
[4] Bouchet, François., L'Agriculture Bio-Dynamique (Deux Versants, Paris, 2003), p.67
[5] Lovel, Hugh., A Biodynamic Farm (Acres USA, 2000), p.122-3
[6] Some practitioners chose to add the valerian 507 later and only when the barrel compost has transformed into humus. See the profile of valerian 507, Chapter 2.
[7] Henderson, Gita., ‘Cow Pat Pit, Where Did it Come From?’, Harvests 55/2 (2002), p.4
[8] Jarman, Bernard., ‘Maria Thun, An Appreciation’, Star & Furrow 117, p.17-21
[9] Wine from certified organic/biodynamic vineyards either produced or intended for sale in the USA must now comply with the USDA’s NOP (National Organic Program) restriction which prohibits the application of raw manure to land within 90 days prior to harvest for crops for human consumption not in direct contact with the soil or soil particles. Therefore, chickens must be removed from vineyards 90 days before harvest, although they are free to remain on other parts of the same property.
[10] Lovel, Hugh., A Biodynamic Farm (Acres USA, 2000), p.123
[11] Poppen, Jeff., The Barefoot Farmer (USA, 2001), p.193
[12] Henderson, op. cit., p.3. Henderson reports bentonite, serpentine rock (68% silica and 22% magnesium), seaweed and stinging nettle being used in New Zealand as a substitute for basalt.
[13] Lovel, Hugh., A Biodynamic Farm (Acres USA, 2000), p.123
[14] Poppen, Jeff., The Barefoot Farmer (USA, 2001), p.193
[15] Jarman, Bernard., ‘Maria Thun, An Appreciation’, Star & Furrow 117/2012, p.17-21
[16] Henderson, op. cit., p.5 reports Philippe Melville of Weleda saying that small amounts of calcium from the eggshells present in the barrel compost might ‘model’ healthy calcium function in the soil, in the same way that the small amounts of calcium in Weleda Pharmaceutical’s calcium compound ‘model’ a healthy physiology and thus promote a balanced calcium household in the body.
[17] Conversation between Peter Proctor and the author Tuesday afternoon 10th February 2004, at Proctor’s home in New Zealand.
[18] Proctor said basalt dust was plentiful in New Zealand due to volcanic activity there but was hard to find in India, where blue granite is used instead.
[19] Smith, Patricia., ‘Using Valerian the way Steiner intended - An update’, Applied Biodynamics 43/2003-4, p.6 reports New York biodynamic farmer/teacher Steve Storch as waiting until the dung, basalt and eggshell mixture has received the five solid compost preparations 502-506 and for the mix to have then transformed into humus before sprinkling it with the valerian 507 preparation.
[20] Bouchet, op. cit., p.158-9
[21] Courtney, Hugh., ‘Practical Biodynamic Research’, Applied Biodynamics 3/1993, p6-7
[22] Proctor, Peter., with Gillian Cole., Grasp the Nettle (Random House New Zealand, 1997), p.113
[23] Perso communication (Dec 2004) from Bernard Jarman, then Executive Director of the UK Biodynamic Agricultural Association
[24] Perso communication (Dec 2004) from Anne Mendenhall, then of the Demeter Association, USA
[25] Bouchet, op. cit., p.120-121
[26] Courtney, Hugh., ‘Practical Biodynamic Research’, Applied Biodynamics 3/1993, p6-7
[27] Henderson, op. cit., p.4
[28] Sattler, Friedrich., and von Wistinghausen, Eckard., Bio-Dynamic Farming Practice (Bio-Dynamic Agricultural Association UK, 1992) trans. by A. Meuss, p.89
[29] Henderson, op. cit., p.2



from http://www.slate.com/articles/health...ertilizer.html

A Dangerous Fixation
Synthetic nitrogen was born 100 years ago; it’s why half of us are alive.

By Jonathan Mingle|Posted Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Consider Carl Bosch our leading candidate for a modern Prometheus. This year marks a century since Bosch, a chemist, opened the Oppau, Germany-based Stickstoffwerke (“nitrogen works”)—the first factory to produce synthetic ammonia, the main ingredient of chemical fertilizers.

It was an impressive technical feat that helped earn Bosch the Nobel Prize in 1931. His fellow chemist Fritz Haber had pioneered and patented the process for “fixing” inert nitrogen (the gas that makes up 78 percent of the atmosphere) into a usable, reactive form. Bosch figured out how to do it economically and on a large scale.

Modern agriculture was born when an abundant supply of synthetic nitrogen started flowing at Oppau. The Haber-Bosch process busted wide open the natural limits on plant growth. Nitrogen is a building block of all proteins and other molecules necessary for life, including DNA, and a critical nutrient for all plants and animals. Most of the nitrogen naturally fixed from the atmosphere for plant use is captured by bacteria that grow on the roots of legumes like peas and bean plants. Ammonia is transformed by these symbiotic bacteria into nitrates, which are then taken up by plants. Until 1913, cultivating legumes, recycling manure and crop residues, and mining deposits of bird droppings in South America were the primary sources of nitrogen in agriculture.

Bosch figured out how to react hydrogen culled from natural gas with atmospheric nitrogen at very high temperatures and pressures and in the presence of an iron-based catalyst. The resulting ammonia gas could be easily transformed into ammonium nitrate or urea for use in fertilizers. His work effectively removed the primary limiting factor that kept human populations in check.

Where would we be without this feat of modern alchemy? Well, for starters, many of us wouldn’t be without it: Half of us wouldn’t be alive today if not for synthetic nitrogen.

The Oppau Stickstoffwerke was a kind of existential hinge. In 1913, there were about 1.7 billion people in the world, and the factory fixed about 7,300 tons of nitrogen in its first year. Today there are 7 billion of us and more than 120 million tons of nitrogen are produced every year using techniques that haven’t changed all that much. More than 80 percent of that reactive nitrogen goes into fertilizers for agriculture. A 2008 paper in Nature Geoscience contains a remarkable graph showing how closely world population growth has tracked the increase in fertilizer production—and how a world without it could sustain only 3.5 billion people. That counterfactual can make one’s head swim a bit. It’s like imagining the Back to the Future scenario of your parents never marrying, but on a global scale, or the plot for a Malthusian-themed Newt Gingrich alternative-history novel. Another mind-blowing way to think about it: On average, half of the nitrogen in your body was synthetically fixed.

For this reason alone, the Haber-Bosch process is considered by many scientists and historians to be the most transformational technological development of the modern age. But the case gets even stronger once you consider all of its unintended consequences. For, as with the original Prometheus, progress always comes with a price, in this case water and air pollution, deteriorating human health, reduced biodiversity, soil acidification, and accelerated global warming, to name a few.

Adding all that reactive nitrogen has effectively fertilized whole ecosystems beyond farms’ boundaries, creating a host of downstream and downwind problems. “One atom can have cascading effects on land and water, causing loss of biodiversity, algal blooms,” says Eric Davidson, president of the Woods Hole Research Center and an expert on the global nitrogen cycle, “and the same atom of N keeps getting cycled through the system.”

This nitrogen cascade manifests in a variety of ways. Nitrogen oxides contribute to the production of ground-level ozone, or smog, which increases the risk of serious respiratory illness and cancer; a different problem arises in the stratosphere, where these gases destroy beneficial UV-blocking ozone. Nitrogen fertilizers also stimulate natural bacteria to produce more nitrous oxide, which contributes to acid rain and is a greenhouse gas that traps 300 times more heat per molecule than does carbon dioxide. Reactive nitrogen infiltrates surface streams and groundwater, polluting drinking wells. Excess levels of nitrogen in some ecosystems bolsters some species at the expense of others, leading to overall reduced biodiversity.

Perhaps the most visible impacts are the huge “dead zones” in the Baltic Sea and other areas downstream from farms. One of the worst is in the Gulf of Mexico, where fertilizer runoff carried by the Mississippi River feeds huge algae blooms that deprive other organisms of oxygen. The zone changes in size depending on the flow volume of the river and other seasonal factors. Last year it was about 6,700 square miles—larger than Connecticut.

Our use of synthetic nitrogen is head-scratchingly inefficient: One study found that for every 100 grams of synthetic nitrogen used in agriculture in 2005, only 17 grams found their way into crops or animal products consumed by humans. Most farmers only have two data points available to judge the efficiency of their fertilizer use: their crop yield and the amount of nitrogen they apply each year. Those are very crude proxies. In between those events, a vastly complex set of chemical reactions takes place in soil, plants, and the atmosphere that researchers are still working to understand.

“The farmers really don’t want to lose yield,” Davidson says. “The problem is that nitrogen is a relatively cheap insurance policy. In most years they won’t need it but in a few years they will.” He points to a lack of incentives to use nitrogen judiciously. Farmers from China to Iowa are under pressure to maintain high yields and profits. There’s little penalty for overapplying synthetic nitrogen but a significant perceived risk to underapplying it.

The lack of farm-level data on yields, timing, rate, and amount of nitrogen application, indigenous soil nitrogen, and other important variables is a key factor holding back improvements in nitrogen-use efficiency. “It’s surprising how little data there is,” says Kenneth Cassman, a professor of agronomy at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. “We have some idea, but it’s not good enough when we have to double food production and reduce environmental impact all in the next 30 years” to meet anticipated demand from a growing global population.

The small fraction of applied nitrogen that gets taken up by crops is one source of inefficiency. But we are profligate even with the nitrogen that actually makes it into the plant. Last month, the United Nations Environment Program released a study detailing some of the compounding sources of inefficiency. For example, worldwide about 80 percent of nitrogen harvested in crops and grass goes to feed livestock instead of feeding people directly. Much of that nitrogen winds up in their manure and then gases off as it sits in giant open lagoons near intensive animal production centers or when it is spread onto fields without being properly mixed into the soil. And according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, a whopping one-third of all food produced globally is wasted—discarded by consumers or lost or spoiled before reaching the market.

The UNEP study authors propose a “20:20 for 2020” target of improving nitrogen use efficiency by 20 percent and reducing overall nitrogen use by 20 million tons each year. They also suggest that consumers in developed countries become “demitarians” by reducing their meat consumption by half, since meat-based diets are much less nitrogen-efficient than plant-based diets.

But “all of the demand for increased livestock products is coming from India, China, Africa,” Cassman says, so reduced consumption of meat in richer countries “doesn’t make much difference for projections of food supply and demand.” Indeed, 80 percent of the global increase in consumption of nitrogen fertilizers between 2000 and 2009 came from India and China.

Cutting back on agricultural production is not much of an option in a world where the population is expected to reach 9.2 billion (and possibly as high as 10.5 billion) by midcentury.

While feeding 10 billion people will require synthetic fertilizers, bequeathing them a livable climate and cleaner air and water will require much more judicious use of applied nitrogen. “The solution is to provide tools so we can actually measure what farmers’ nitrogen use is,” Cassman says. “Every farmer should know what their nitrogen fertilizer efficiency is in a fairly robust way.”

Such information could help policymakers design better incentives to encourage more farmers to adopt promising techniques for reducing nitrogen loss, such as conservation tillage (using little or no plowing), soil erosion control, planting winter cover crops, and more precise management of the timing, rate, and volume of fertilizer application. Davidson points to efforts to limit farming near streams and in 100-year flood plains as other steps that can make a dent in the problems associated with nitrogen runoff.

“In the past 40 years [American farmers] have massively improved nitrogen efficiency without really trying a lot,” Cassman says. “In the next 30 years I guarantee they can do at least as well, if not better, if they just have confidence they can do it. All we’re talking about is trying to accelerate it through better decision-making and promulgation of research.”

He proposes setting up information-sharing systems and incentive-based programs that would reward farmers who improve their own nitrogen efficiency, say, 1 percent every year. “It would take the onus off of penalties, make it like a sport like track or swimming where you’re competing against yourself. They would buy into it, lower costs, and improve their profitability.”

After a century of nitrogen fixation, it’s hard to even imagine a world without it. And sheer demographic momentum means we will continue to rely on it until the next Carl Bosch comes along to upend the rules of agriculture.

While Oppau’s legacy today reaches into every corner of the globe—and our bodies—the facility itself didn’t last that long. In 1921, workers discovered that 4,500 tons of ammonium nitrate stored in a warehouse had hardened during a period of wet weather into an unusable mass. So, to loosen it up, they drilled holes in it, stuck some dynamite in, and lit the fuse. The resulting blast killed more than 500 people (including those workers), destroyed 80 percent of the homes in the town, and ripped the roofs off of homes 15 miles away.

It’s difficult to blame them, though, since no one knew at the time about the fertilizer’s explosive properties. And they were keen to not let such a valuable resource go to waste.

 

[JM]

does this answer your question:

nitrogen is what our dna is made from so it is important to use as natural a source as possible.. that's my view on the matter

 

[JM]

from http://www.acresusa.com/toolbox/repr...989_Luebke.pdf

Leubke on Compost
Reprint from Acres USA, December 1989 • Vol. 19, no. 12

Government scientists, land grant colleges, the USDA, even jailed political movements, all talk about the high tech agriculture needed to feed the world, and most farmers become intense and distressed when ubiquitous pollution problems force regulatory officials to remove the worst of the worst poisons from the market. In this propaganda process, organiculture is put down and given the scholastic sneer, as though these practitioners were merely heel-dragging peasants up to their armpits in mud. Yet it is precisely this upstart movement — no bigger than the palm of a hand in the global scheme of things — that holds the key to scientific high tech farming and a capacity for feeding the planet in century 21.

ACRES U.S.A. had a few pointed questions that needed answers when part of the editorial team went to Austria and other parts of Europe last summer. We knew that most Austrian farmers were not allowed to sell their vegetables for almost an entire season in the wake of Chernobyl. And yet there was one farmer who reported root crops free of cesium. On-scene near Puerbach, Austria, we found instruments we’d barely heard of outside of California — the Soil Solution Tubes, for instance. And when Siegfried Luebke quoted back at us fare that we ran in ACRES U.S.A. almost 20 years ago, we recognized confirmation that we’d been on the right track all along.

“Now is the time to mention the importance of organic matter, because the dead, complex organic products produced by the living organisms in the soil also possess a base exchange capacity. Any increase in the proper type of organic matter increases the base exchange capacity of the soil, and consequently the ability of the soil to retain and accumulate the positively charged plant nutrients also increases. If the living organisms in the soil prosper in the correct manner and in the presence of the proper nutrients, the residue of organic matter also accumulates, and the potential fertility increases accordingly. We can now understand why organic matter by itself is not equivalent to fertility. Its presence, however, is essential in order that the soil may retain and accumulate positively charged plant nutrients as they are released by weathering, bacterial activity, and the addition of fertilizer.” This was written by Lyle Wynd in 1952.

“Are we incapable of learning?” asked Siegfried and Uta Luebke.

“Often I have asked plant and agricultural experts what they would think of a direct determination of the nitrate level on the spot, at the root of the plant directly and I wanted to compare these results with the laboratory test results. One of them gave the answer that this kind of examination was too uncertain for him and also too involved and cumbersome because the wide fluctuation in the nitrate levels when testing in the field cannot be allocated statistically and because these “uncertain” values would be useless for statistical interpretation. We have conducted a great quantity of these tests in periodic intervals and we came to realize that the plant is a very intelligent being — it knows exactly what to do. These tests always showed enough microbially produced nutrients when the soil was in proper condition. Enough of these nutrients were available to supply the plant during the whole growing season with this flowing stream of nutrients.

“There was never an excess of nitrates to be found in the plants themselves, although this is one of the things organic fertilization is blamed for.”

“At the plant root, with the help of the plant specific (specific to the particular plant family) steering mechanics, those nutrients are being produced which the plant needs for its growth. In 1958 Dr. E.E. Pfeiffer wrote that this process between the plant roots and the microbes is reversible and that there exists a mutual interdependence between them, whereby there is never an excess produced. When my wife mentioned this in a lecture on composting at a conference the next day there was again an article in the agricultural agency paper [Kammernachrichten] on the front page, so the farmers who are being subjected to receiving this paper automatically would read it. This article stated that organic fertilizer produced higher nitrate levels in feed although Lebensmittel-forschungsstelle [the Agency for Food Research] had proved the opposite years ago with our own produce.

“Are we incapable of learning??

“It was 1938 when the then Secretary for U.S. Agriculture, Henry Wallace, called upon the American nation to take measures against the progressive devastation of the soil. He wrote: This terribly destructive process is excusable in a young civilization. It is not excusable in the United States in the year 1938.”

“What has happened in the U.S.A., in the whole world? Is this state of affairs still excusable as in a young civilization near totally ignorant of high tech science?”

We now have to ask ourselves this question in all earnest: Have we been capable of learning in regards to the fact that the soil is every nation’s own best capital?

Siegfried Luebke — with the finest library on microbiology in Europe at his farm — answered our questions, and stayed on for more than we could possibly include in an article. We have now translated our questions, his answers, and with some few pictures in tow we hope to make clear what high tech science is all about, and if in the process we shame those who continue to chant their litany about high tech poisons and fertilizers, well that’s the way it is. Our readers, certainly, can think for themselves without reference to a higher approved authority. The interview in this issue is the result of transcribed questions and answers — of a running conversation between editor Charles WaIters Jr. and Siegfried Luebke made while driving between Puerbach and Salzberg.

--------------------------------------------------------------

All Things Considered in the Wake of the Chernobyl Nuclear Accident

Since our interview this month is essentially a jump from the front page story, we will not detain the reader with biographical details. Suffice it to say that Uta Luebke came to the ACRES U.S.A. Conference in November three years ago, and her message—A Window into the Soil—enjoyed standing room only reception. With the aid of tapes, film and a translator, ACRES U.S.A. has been able to learn more about what is happening on that Austrian farm. The translation that follows was made instantaneously by Luebke’s son, Aurel who speaks excellent English, and a separate translation was made by Hedi Aschl of Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. ACRES U.S.A. editor Charles Walters Jr. asked the questions. For the opening exchange, many of the questions have been left out so as not to disturb Luebke’s vital narrative. In the picture left, Siegfried Luebke is shown measuring the supply of oxygen, as discussed in this report. The supply of oxygen is of utmost importance for microbial activity. If oxygen in the soil is being diminished through compaction, through stagnant water, or other detrimental circumstances, this leads to predominantly anaerobic conditions, which in turn lead to poor conditions for microbial activity and metabolism—and can cause a loss of high amounts of nitrogen. In cases where the soil is being improved by enrichment with carbon compounds, the structure of the soil will become loose and crumbly. The sorption capacity of the soil is greatly increased and the nutrients stay fixed where they are being made available for the growth of the plant in the interdependent relationship of the plant roots and the microbes. This nutrient flow is fluent and the presence of oxygen is a prerequisite. “We go directly to the root zone to measure this oxygen,” Luebke said. The probe is being inserted directly into the root zone—while still being closed—only after it was placed in the soil it is being opened by way of a Schieber [gate valve] and then the air in the soil is being siphoned off with a balloon through the probe and guided over a sensitive oxygen cell. It is then possible to read the oxygen content on the scale. In this particular picture the O2 content in the root zone is 18%.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Siegfried Luebke

ACRES U.S.A. What happened to your farm when Chernobyl went up in smoke and radioactivity? More important, why were you interested in radiation enough to have detection equipment on hand in the first place?

LUEBKE. To make my answer meaningful, let me give some background information. In my studies of research publications in the field of microbiology, I came across the work of Professor Stoklasa. After 25 years of observations and studies on the dispersion of radioactive materials in the atmosphere, in the lithosphere and the hydrosphere, in the air, in the water and in the soil, and their effect on the biochemical life processes, he summarized his findings in his 1932 book, Biology of Radium and Uranium. Stoklasa lived in the CSSR and was head of the Federal Experimental Laboratories in Prague. He also was a member of the Scientific Committee of the Federal Radiologic Institute in Prague. His institute produced many valuable scientific papers on biochemical processes in the soil, and the orientation in his research did not only correspond with the then up and coming trend of the N-P-K mentality. He dedicated his research to the history of mining in St. Joachimstal. This city had been well known since the middle ages for its mining and metallurgy. The geological formations were known for their radioactivity and the Joachimstal has been known since 1901 as the oldest radium spa. Very few people know that the classical papers written 450 years ago by the physician and pharmacist Georg Agricola, the 12 Books About Mining and Metallurgy, were translated into English by the mining metallurgical engineer, Herbert Hoover, who later became president of the United States. It may interest your American readers to know that Joachimstal was the origin of the term for your currency—In the 16th century, the Joachimstal was the center of the major silver mining region where coins were struck. In 1519 the “Thaler” originated. It later became known as the “dollar.” Radium research developed in this area. Henri Bequerel proved that uranium salts independently and spontaneously emit a penetrating radiation. He thus discovered radioactivity in 1896. He instructed Madame Marie Curie, who worked in his laboratory, to investigate the substances which contain radioactivity. Madame Curie wrote her doctoral thesis on this subject: The Radioactivity of Various Substances. Professor Stoklasa reports in his book that in Joachimstal only uranium was separated from the pitchblende (uraninite) and that the alkaline residues remained unused, being considered a ballast substance. These alkaline ore residues—in which the uranium was present in exceedingly small quantities—were being thrown onto waste dumps and into the creek. Monsieur and Madame Curie asked the then president Dr. Euard Suess, to let them have a larger quantity of pitchblende and those alkaline uranium ore residues. The then Austrian Ministry of Agriculture (Ackerbauministerium) sent several freight cars of this “ballast substance” to Paris free of charge. In this “worthless” material Madame Curie succeeded in discovering— among many other elements—radium, for which discovery she received the Nobel prize. Professor Stoklasa also researched the influence of the various radioactive elements on the development, germination and the metabolic processes of the microbes. Our own observations showed that the microbial population in the soil is subject to strong fluctuations. After working through Professor Stoklasa’s books, I acquired a small Geiger counter. This was long before the reactor accident in Chernobyl. With this instrument I started to—initially on a test basis—probe the various forms of terrain. I intended to find which fluctuations could be detected from natural radiation. For this purpose I scanned the terrain within the radius of approximately 5 km (3.125 miles). Over the course of months it was indeed possible to detect small variations, though these stayed within certain limits. For a more precise re-examination, certainly a highly sensitive instrument would have been required. As with all other experiments and tests, it was my aim to first examine concepts of a certain direction for the usefulness of results and its implications by way of preliminary testing. I tested periodically, and the results started to climb dramatically. I was unable to find an explanation for this rise. Most likely I was the only person who detected these changes in the open field because chance had led me into this direction of research at the time. Every day the radioactivity levels climbed higher, the measuring data being different with each geologic formation. On April 30 and 31 the instrument was at times not capable of recording and measuring data at various points. Sometimes the needle stayed on the highest level continuously and the instrument made noise incessantly. I was lost for an explanation. I expanded my tests over a larger area and came to realize that the measuring data were at the same high level within a wide radius. May 1, 1986 was a Thursday, a holiday in Austria. I wanted to call various government agencies in order to let them know about this phenomenon. The government offices were closed, of course. On the eve of May 1, TV reported the first information on the reactor catastrophe at Chernobyl. In the wake of this news, total headlessness prevailed everywhere. Chernobyl made us realize that a model was needed for interferences like this in order to be able to take conceptive measures as to what had to be done after a reactor accident. Vegetables grown in the open field were banned from the market, at the same time, milk, meat— in short, all non-storable foods—were subjected to very strict controls. In no time, all the produce grown and produced before Chernobyl sold out. We were not allowed to sell the sheep cheese we produce and had to destroy it. We received a small compensation from the government for the loss. Milk from sheep is known for assimilating cesium especially fast. Experiments had shown that certain amounts of these substances, after being injected into the aorta, can be detected in the milk within minutes. We had to have the milk tested and we had to wait until the values were lowered to within the officially established limits. Only then were we permitted to resume the sale of milk. The consequences of this disaster were to become obvious much later: there was a high mortality rate for young sheep in the spring of the following year, and the newborn sheep showed malformations. Our losses of sheep were very high. The government offices kept working after the general hysteria had subsided. The levels of radioactivity kept diminishing slowly, as recorded with our instrument, but they stayed considerably above the level recorded months before on the same spot. Only by my accidentally measuring the levels of radioactivity before the reactor accident was I enabled to make comparisons—likely I was the only person in the agricultural field to have done so. Solutions for agriculture were now heard from the experts. Some recommendations were to shave the ground down to 30 cm of its top soil and to store the used-up soil in earth rows. I studied the American recommendations for measures in agriculture after a nuclear accident (Agriculture Handbook Number 395). To store these enormous amounts of soil in earth rows would have been technically impossible. The theory turned into a chimera this way because vast areas in Europe were contaminated. It would have been necessary to entirely encircle the cities with earth rows. On February 26 another official appeared at our farm and again took samples of the root vegetables still available. The vegetables were to be tested for cesium—Cs 134 and Cs 137—all in the wake of the Chernobyl accident. We still had potatoes, carrots, black garden radishes and red beets stored, and the official took one sample of each. Three weeks later he returned with the results: the produce from our farm operation planted after the nuclear accident was free of cesium and the official informed us that this constituted an exception. Trying to find an explanation for this test result I passed this test result on to the head of the Plantphysiological Institute in Vienna, Professor Kinzel. [It follows in part.]

Parenthetically, I would like to add that the government agencies tested for cesium on a broad scale, but the results were not made public. However, from the tests done in February they did inform us about our test results, with the additional comment that our cesium-free produce was the exception. The continual tests done by the government agencies were for residues or for contamination of various different kinds, whereby our produce tested free of these substances time and again. Many tests were run long before the Chernobyl accident, especially at the beginning of our work. The actual values from the cesium- free results we only learned from the last test done in February.

“I am pleased for you about the downright unbelievable fact that your samples and tests in regards to the cesium has produced the result “NN”—not detectable. Perhaps your inorganic substance very rich soil has such a high absorptive capacity that it binds all cations and with them the cesium especially well and that it releases them at such a slow rate that in the singular harvest the values will be very low. In any case this is very gratifying for your method!” In July 1986 Professor Kinzel visited our farm together with a group of students and took soil samples in order to compare our soils with the neighbouring soils for their enzyme activity. This is the letter [in part].

“The soil samples which I took at your farm at the end of May have been analyzed now. The difference to the conventionally treated soils surpass my expectations.” Nr. 35 is the soil sample from your neighbour's corn field, Nr. 36 is from one of your vegetable beds which you explained to have been organically farmed for eight years, Nr. 37 is the bed which has only been organically farmed for a short period of time, located right beside the house, Nr. 38 is the sample taken from your compost. The latter could not be sieved before the test due to the very large particles which might cause the results to not be absolutely comparable.

“Your soils are a little more neutral (slightly alkaline) in comparison to your neighbour's. The enzyme activity is a multiple of the one of your neighbour’s. Dehydrogenase can be considered as a general indicator for the level of life in the soil. Your level of activity is four times as high as the one of your neighbour’s. The other enzymes are responsible for the decomposition of organic substance and therefore for the constant supply of nutrients to the soil. It is interesting to note that the phosphatase activity in the pH range peculiar to the soil is ten times higher than the alkaline phosphatase with your neighbour’s while in your case the activity is altogether higher and the difference between the two phosphatases is considerably smaller. I will try to find out what this can mean. As a concluding remark I would like to mention that a high microbial activity does not in every case have to indicate a high degree of health of the soil. In cases for instance where too much green manure is rotting in the soil there will be high microbial activity. But there is no indication to assume this for your soil.”

In 1985 the owner of the Laboratories for Soil Testing and Trace Element Analysis, Dr. Balzer, visited our farm. We developed a very lively conversation about our method of building up the soil, and Dr. Balzer offered to test samples taken at four different locations and to inform us about the results. On July 24, 1985 we received the results. Dr. Balzer made reference to a “heavy administration of fertilizers from the outside.” We have supplied our soils solely with green manure. His test results showed that almost all main nutrient levels reach the upper limit. The suggestions that certain trace elements allow conclusions that there is compaction in the subsoil or lack of oxygen we can disprove with our own tests. They show that our soils are well supplied with oxygen to a depth of 30 cm as well as they show a good microbial population.

ACRES U.S.A. For how long was sale of your vegetables prohibited?

LUEBKE. First, it was pretty much for the whole season.

ACRES U.S.A. Let’s go back to the identification of cesium, or the absence thereof, in root crops. Did you discover the absence of this contaminant in well balanced, living soil? What was the final explanation?

LUEBKE. In the fall—it was around October, November—the food control police took samples of all the root vegetables. They sent them in for a cesium test. First they thought it was a mistake. They did it again and again, and they found no cesium. They could not prove that there was a Chernobyl accident by measuring our crops. We never did get an exact explanation, but we had a few ways of explaining it. We think the humus just ate up the cesium if the bacterial activity in the soil was good enough. In other words the plants can direct what they can use. We do not know if this has been scientifically proved or not. We concluded that kalium [potassium] in the counting system had something to do with this. The plant uses up the cesium if it can’t get potassium. So if the activity of the bacteria is high enough, the plants can actually direct the delivery of kalium instead of cesium.

ACRES U.S.A. So if you have the proper balance and enough life in the soil, plants can get the potassium from the soil system and bypass the cesium? Do you think that’s what happened?

LUEBKE. That’s what we think happened. The fellow who took the samples sent them to a testing laboratory in Vienna. At first they thought the measuring instrument was broken. They could not believe that something like this was possible.

ACRES U.S.A. So in effect you’re saying that you have a plot of soil that is uniquely alive, and it is alive because of the preparations you use and the compost you use to build up humus? One of the things you use to build up humus is rye crops that have been inoculated then with certain bacteria, then turned in with the spading machine. You turn this in with the spading machine after you’ve sprayed with the inoculant of your own development?

LUEBKE. Yes, but it’s not only rye crops, it’s any green crop or parts that you leave after you harvest, any grown plant that you bring back into the soil. For us rye is a good thing to bring back to the soil because it actually grows fast. It brings a lot of green back into the soil in a short time.

ACRES U.S.A. The real key to it, though, is how you make your preparations, and how you get the various microorganisms soil adapted?

LUEBKE. We get the bacteria in the solution that you saw, some of them. And we make our bacteria ourselves in a form that can actually work out in the country even though it might be minus 20 degrees Celsius in the winter, or it might be 40 degrees Celsius in the summer. They can still work, and they are not like these you saw in solution that have to be kept at 10 degrees or 15 degrees so they don’t die.

ACRES U.S.A. You slowly introduce them into the soil, into compost, into residue and let them adapt themselves, and once you have them adapted now you move them on out to do the real fieldhand work?

LUEBKE. We put them out over the compost and into the soil, and we bring them out directly on the leftovers from your harvest or the rye. With that much activity you can break down rye within two or three weeks.

ACRES U.S.A. How many microorganisms are you using in the preparation you make?

LUEBKE. We’re still trying to do testings with the samples. There are 60, 70, 80. It seems to be human nature to take the easiest route when there are problems to be solved. In studying the direct feeding of the plants with organic fertilizers and microbial nitrification, I was surprised to find a large amount of contradicting material on the subject in the scientific literature. Papers about organic movements soon led to the discovery, too, that the authors—when giving their recommendations to readers—had not done so out of experience based on their own practice of principles—they had simply copied other authors or thought them up at their desks. Only by tedious work over years have we been able to learn laboratory tests cannot be put on the same plane as the real life process. Experiments cannot possibly be duplicated in the field with the same circumstances being prevalent. Also the results of tests in various stages of growth and various seasons cannot be compared and validated with the help of statistics. Life resists the attempt to be pressed into a definite pattern that corresponds with our mathematical-statistical conception. Any attempts to derive generally applicable rules in order to move a little closer in direction to truth leads to the impression of being forced. Yet the answers we found in the field, in nature, turned out to be matter-of-fact, dispassionate. So every attempt to understand life processes as interdependent opened new doors for us which continuously presented us with new problems and questions. In order to get an overview we searched the scientific findings of past decades worldwide. We classified and compared their statements, which led to us discovering many contradictory data and interpretations. Worst of all was the impression that results obtained in laboratory experiments and tests approximated life processes in the field and there was the idea that nature had to run this way and no other. This is very wrong. What I am saying does not constitute an attack on our science. It is simply the terse summarization and outcome of our many experiments and observations in the field and in nature. This lead to our growing conviction that we can only get control of the real life processes—and also the problems regarding our environment—by having our students in the universities and the agricultural colleges take up their studies in the field, studying the real, life processes. This will invariably lead to finding the same results we had to accept in our years of observations.

ACRES U.S.A. What you say may be true, but can you take the sophisticated lab procedures required into the field?

LUEBKE. A very fast indirect test for the present microbial state of the soil is possible with chromatography as developed by Dr. Ehrenfried Pfeiffer. It is not a substitute for chemical analysis, but it allows for a very fast judgement of the overall condition of the soil. It is especially gratifying that it is possible to control the change that occurs when soil is organically built up into a living structure, which is done in connection with other rapid test parameters. When the late Mrs. Erica Sabarth [of Pfeiffer Laboratories, Spring Valley, New York] showed me this method she told me that she had showed it to many interested persons and that she was later greatly astonished about the wilful misinterpretations they derived from this. She explained to me the following fact, The chromatography makes sense for a test on the soil only when the sample is being examined immediately after being taken and when from the same spot new samples are periodically taken and the resulting chromatograms are being compared. This makes it possible to control the building up—and also the dying—of the soil. In this view she had shown the chromatography—as applied for soil testing—to the interested persons. So she did with me, too.

ACRES U.S.A. Has the university shown an interest?

LUEBKE. We have had inquiries from agricultural university students for help with their dissertation on the subject of chromatography. I would like to cite one case. This particular student did not want to part with the usual pathway of studying. We did try to explain the meaning of chromatography in the sense of the above mentioned possible control. When viewing his work later on we were horrified to discover that his work contained 50 samples which were up to three years old. He also tried to explain or answer these senseless tests and the resulting data by classifying entirely different soils and samples using correlation equations and regression lines. And the resulting “findings” are commonly called scientific. Such work is useless.

ACRES U.S.A. Of course, that is only a case report. What else?

LUEBKE. In addition to this, plagiarism is in full bloom. An employee of a steel manufacturing company claims to have invented the paper chromatography Pfeiffer in fact invented. This woman changed the extract solution. With this change of procedure this woman had chromatography patented as her own invention in Munich by the German Patent Agency [Deutsches Patent]—Mit einer einfachen chromatografischen Papiermethode die Beurteilung des Rottezustandes von Kompost pruefen zu koennen—to be able to test the state of decay in compost with a simple paper method. An experienced user of this chromatography method can tell with one glance at the text in the patent paper what game has been played here. This course of events repeats itself often, and it becomes obvious with what inordinate ambition many students approach their field of study. Many of them invent what had been invented long before them—with the wish to get as famous and well known as possible or to gain materially as much as possible. They seek to override the actual goal: to research and to stay with the truth in research. There is no place for personal ambition in true science, absolutely none. It is a rather remarkable fact that most of the knowledge we should actually have is already there, and has been there for a long time, which means it had been. Researched before—and yet it had been “invented new” time and again. For our task I found it necessary to read many dissertations and to compare them. The form of the thesis is methodically predefined and it is attempted to quote as many sources as possible while clues for the existence of already researched solutions are being deliberately avoided. The experiments conducted by “oneself ” though are being substantiated by a statistical mass of data (datagraveyardis a good word) and one is happy and high with this intoxication with numbers, which are being classed from a new point of view, under new scientific perspectives.

ACRES U.S.A. Ah, the wheel gets reinvented in every century?

LUEBKE. Yes. Yet the little that really needs to be said can—except for a very few exceptions—be expressed on a single sheet of paper. Some of the candidates writing a thesis even have invented the sun. But I have not found one dissertation yet which would offer a solution as to how we can uphold our order of life, or a dissertation to show where our doings lead if we keep on in the same manner as we do now. These questions the inventors of the sun could not answer either.

ACRES U.S.A. Is this research conceit really the basis for conflict between organiculture and so-called conventional agronomy?

LUEBKE. Yes, from this perspective. It is easier, to understand the core of the conflict between the conventional method and the organic line in agriculture. Whether this is a malevolent side-glance at, or the angry condemnation of the new and the thus resulting, often entirely unfounded rejection of these developments, I leave to you. Only the unerring [incorruptible] observers examine how much truth these statements contain, and this also allows us to draw conclusions as to the character and the intelligence of the observer. We have not been spared this confrontation either. To be of consequence, there is a requirement that convincing evidence be put onto the table. We were forced to do this. And the file on the development of this matter has become fat. We calculated our costs the way every merchant, is forced to do it. Our calculation revealed that many farmers produce significantly under their actual costs. In the meantime this evil has become worldwide.

ACRES U.S.A. Back to the bacteria. You’re not trying to follow in the steps of Rudolf Steiner, putting cow manure into the horn and harvesting the cosmic forces?

LUEBKE. We are not doing that. Our bacteria are purchased from a laboratory in Maryland by genus and species, and adapted to the job of working with soil, breaking down manure.

ACRES U.S.A. The bacteria, when you grow them, do you have commercial quantities so that you can supply others in Austria?

LUEBKE. Yes, we make more than we need because other people have been asking us to make them a supply. A lot of people have tried to propagate bacteria, but they have not been successful in making compost or in bringing the bacteria into the field. The bacteria—unless adapted—die after a few days.

ACRES U.S.A. What kind of a life factor do you have?

LUEBKE. If you bring out only the 30 grams that you use for 1,000 square meters, or 300 grams per hectare—it depends on how fast you introduce them into the soil. If they’re put out to UV light, they die pretty soon. But if you bring them in right away or you put them in the compost right away and they find a place to live, they’re going to survive, most of them, because they’re built to last.

ACRES U.S.A. They’re not something you could bottle and leave on the shelf for very long?

LUEBKE. You can store them. They’re put in a powder so they can be stored, and they won’t die for two years. People buy them and we mail them. They’re in powder form, meaning their activity is put so low that it would take two years for them to die.

ACRES U.S.A. In your field you said every plant fixes its own nitrogen at its root zone level under ideal conditions. Move over 10 to 20 centimeters and the nitrogen level drops down to what the fertilizer bag can provide. Is that what you said?

LUEBKE. When your bacteria activity is at the right level in the soil, the plant can direct how much nitrogen it wants at the moment. The mechanism is not entirely understood—if it’s just some liquid that the root builds up, or if a vibration takes place or whatever it is, the plant can direct to the bacteria how much nitrogen it wants. And if the bacteria are working, they can get so much nitrogen to the root and only to the root and not between all the roots. If you look at the soil, there’s only maybe 10% space taken up by the roots, and all the other spots wouldn’t really need as much activity on nitrogen or potassium. If you’ have too much nitrogen in the soil, in the plant, well—in Austria, people are not allowed to bring their products to the market if they have too much nitrogen in the vegetables.

ACRES U.S.A. Nitrate nitrogen?

LUEBKE. Nitrate in their vegetables. There are limits for organic farming. There are limits for conventional farming. If feeding the plant is going on with bacteria, the plant will never use too much nitrogen out of the soil, and it will direct the soil as to how much it needs at the moment. It’s not constant. At the beginning, how much nitrogen does a plant use? It maybe needs 20, 30 ppm nitrate. When it builds up the fruit, it needs maybe 2,000 ppm nitrate. But this is when the most rain has already come down and washed out all the nitrate. Well, then they have to go out and just shortly before it grows the fruit, put in another load of nitrogen fertilizer. If the growing process works over humus and in soil with ample bacteria, the grower does not need the fertilizer input because the plant can direct what it wants.

ACRES U.S.A. It’ll pull the nitrogen right out of the air, then?

LUEBKE. Well, not only out of the air, it can take nitrogen out of the humus if it can’t get it out of the air. While there are live bacteria, they take the nitrogen out of the air.

ACRES U.S.A. But the point you’re making is that in testing you move 10 cm over and you get a completely different reading. So taking a soil test the way we usually do is questionable? How do you test?

LUEBKE. The Irometer Company of California produces Soil Solution Tubes which make it possible to determine the nutrients directly with the help of a vacuum produced in these tubes. We inserted the ceramic tip directly into the root zone of various plants to determine the microbially produced nutrients. These Soil Solution Tubes—SST—are being used in the U.SA. By way of this method we determined what kind of nutrients are available at the roots of a plant at a given time. The results vary with time and are dependent on various factors—the amount of organic matter, the microbial population, the weather, the season, etc. The difference in results varied considerably as to whether the tests are done at the roots or several centimeters away from the roots. These tests are of great value for us. Knowing the limit of organic substance in our soils, we are able to directly determine the microbially produced nutrients, foremost the nitrogen in its ion state, with this ideal method. I would like to stress once more that since the year 1971 we have never used chemical fertilizers in any of our experiments. It has been our aim to study and understand [record] the nutrient contents of organically built up [improved] soils without compromise, without the influence or interference of other fertilizers. To dispel any doubts we had our intent attested by a notary public in 1972. At this point of time we did not realize yet what was to be ahead of us.

ACRES U.S.A. Let’s get back to the measurement of nitrate with the SST tubes.

LUEBKE. Fine. It happened one beautiful summer day that we found a nitrate level of 2,000 ppm directly in the root zone of garlic . . . 10 cm away, only 40 ppm NO3. The root zone of savoy cabbage showed a level of 680 ppm NO3, 10 cm away the nitrate was 50 ppm. As an experiment we bought broccoli which had been started in cardboard containers from a greenhouse. With sick plants we found very high levels of nitrite: 14 ppm. At distances of 0.5 cm we took singular samples of the outer part of the root zone which were separated from the natural environment (the soil) by the cardboard container. In the compacted root zone within the container area, a lack of oxygen had developed, and in this area the nitrate had been reduced to nitrite, which lead to serious problems [sickness] for the plants. The cardboard container was partly intact, although it was supposed to rot. A soil test revealed a high enough nutrient level. One singular main root managed to penetrate through the cardboard to the outside and it nourished the plant scantily. The desired development of fibrous roots—which constitute the largest nutritional potential with good plant growth—did not occur. This development was totally blocked by the soil that had been pressed into the cardboard containers. With the carrots we only found 7 ppm nitrate; they were 20 cm [8 inches] long and 6 to 7 cm [approximately 21/2 inches] in diameter; 10 to 15 cm [4 to 6 inches] to the side there were nitrate levels of only 20 to 25 ppm. This showed a reversal of the nitrate levels in the relation between the root zones and the far out zones as compared to the other results, where the nitrate levels in the root zone had been higher than in the surrounding rootless zone. The pea plants were so heavily loaded with pods that the wooden supporting framework could not hold up the rich harvest, so it broke down. We found—staying with the same from the top all the way to the bottom layer of soil—unvarying levels of nitrate of 50 to 60 ppm. The root zones of the tomatoes showed nitrate levels of 650 to 700 ppm. We took nutrients away from the plant and the leaves started to droop and the plant was in danger of dying. The natural microbial supply of the plant with nutrients was not sufficient enough any more to feed the plant after this. We documented all these experiments with slides. The examination of the nitrate level in plant tissues showed that there is never an excess in the plant at the time of nitrate formation.

ACRES U.S.A. What kind of confirmation did the SST tests give you after green manuring?

LUEBKE. The SST tests made it possible to obtain excellent data. We were able to determine that in a well built-up soil, nitrate never gets washed out. After 35 to 40 cm no nitrate was detectable in the nutrient solutions taken from the soil. The varying moisture levels lead to some difficulties in the testing. Experiments to apply the SST testing to the compost lead to the fine pores of the ceramic tip being plugged up after the third or fourth sampling. We also examined the specific gravity of the nutrient solutions from the plant roots and from the compost. The specific gravity of the compost solutions was considerably higher than the one of the soil solutions. It was not possible to continue the tests with the various composts because the plugged pores in the ceramic tip hindered the process after several samples were taken. The SST tubes had to be cleaned by ultra sound after each sampling. Nevertheless, with these experiments in a short time frame, it was possible for us to follow the tremendous microbial conversion—from the anaerobic into the aerobic phase—in its chronological order, this if the fresh raw manure was prepared for composting and when it was aerated on time. The aeration needs to be constantly monitored with oxygen testing. We will continue these tests. Up to now they have provided us with many answers. The compost can be brought to a proper maturity within four to five weeks if the rotting is guided in correct manner.

ACRES U.S.A. Is the microbial count the governing factor?

LUEBKE. Not necessarily. I have read many works that say it is possible to determine the quality of a certain soil by the microbial count, looking for the presence of as many microorganisms as possible. This is only partially correct. Every microbiologist knows that the microbial life in the soil is a constantly changing process, depending on the climate, the moisture, the presence of the various compounds of organic substances in the soil, the oxygen level, or the compaction of the soil, and many other factors. In organic farming it is important to feed the soil. But even so, there are laws here to be recognized. We have tried to feed the soil with organic substances, and we watched for the point in time when the rotting processes would start. It is a known fact that high levels of soil compaction can lead to a very high loss in nitrogen through denitrification. We have studied the micromorphological substance very carefully as it appears after the organic substance has been added, and we have documented the findings at the microscope—magnified up to 300 times—
with many slides. The results showed that with enough oxygen being present and a good microbial population in such a soil, rotting will occur. We discovered that it is possible to microbially build up the soil to a depth of 40 to 50 cm [16 to 20 inches]. The economical limit lay—in our case—in depths to 30 cm [12 inches]. From the top soil zone down to 30 cm [12 inches] and further, the soils showed a homogeneous crumb structure after having been built up. It is of utmost importance to feed the soil. There must never be competition for the nutrients between the plant roots and the microbes. Should this be the case, and should this result in a lowering of the organic substance in the soil, the plant will suffer and be eliminated first and then the soil will start to get microbially depleted, often very rapidly. This is the point when we say The soil is dying. It is dangerous to treat soil in this state with starters because the added microbes use up the last reserves of organic substance. If the soil is being enriched well with organic substance and if it is microbially well populated, an enormous amount of biomass is being produced with the help of the formed CO2 and the photosynthesis which—worked into the soil with the help of compost or a starter—feeds the microbes continuously and thus enriches the soil with carbon compounds which lead to an increase in the ability of the soil to hold water and through which absorption ability is greatly influenced. The application of green manuring—in all its manifold possibilities—is of extreme importance for building up the soil This is not only true for organic farming. If a farmer brings his soil into the biological balance this way and if he keeps life working this way, many problems suddenly disappear. If in addition to this, he is given the possibility to determine the nutrient level by himself on location with a reliable rapid test method, and if his calculation includes the limit of organic substance when calculating the nutrient potential of the mineral fertilizers, he will be able to exactly determine the amount and kind of fertilizer needed, without the danger of the nutrients getting washed out. All applied nutrients are being bound through the high absorption capacity in a well built up soil so that they cannot be washed out.

ACRES U.S.A. This microbial population, then, also determines how much damage pesticide use confers on the soil system?

LUEBKE. Very definitely. The farmers report to us—after continuously building up their soil—that the pesticide and herbicide strain [load] got reduced very fast as a result of the heightened microbial activity. This is very important for farms in the process of making a changeover, because there are legally required waiting periods until the herbicide and pesticide residues have been reduced and eliminated. These waiting periods can be reduced considerably by way of purposeful soil improvement. There is no sense in changing a farm operation to organic and to simply wait out the waiting period without working on the soil in order to improve it. The most sensible proceeding for the changeover can be found in the Certification Standards for 1987 in the state of Maine. There the requirement for the status of a certified organic farm operation is a minimum limit of organic substance, which lies at a minimum of 4%. Every farmer who changes over has to know the meaning of this. It is out of the question to change over by simply omitting the commercial fertilizers, the herbicides and the pesticides and to simply continue working the soil. Every concept works on its own—the mineral one and the organic one. And these differences must be very carefully comprehended and kept apart. In the near future it will be necessary for conventional farmers to raise the absorption capacity of their soils with all the means at their command so the mineral fertilizers, too, will be utilized fully by the plants and cannot be washed out. This means to improve the soil, to organically enliven it again. This is the only possible answer for the farmer’s cost problem and also the key position for the solution of the environmental problem. This problem concerns all farmers.

ACRES U.S.A. In other words, the farmer will have to view his soil as capital, and not as a mine?

LUEBKE. Yes. And seen in this light one can recall an old saying: Show me your soil and I will tell you who you are. It is a fact that one can tell the intelligence of a farmer by looking at the state of his soil—or his helplessness in handling the soil. The soil is his best capital almost everything he owns comes from his soil. Through the overproduction at the cost of the soil whereby the organic substance is diminished more and more, the soil is being destroyed slowly and continuously, and this is the surest way to economical ruin for a farmer who works like this. It is a ruin first for himself and then for his children. He is ignoring the law of the minimum which also applies to the organic substance in the soil. Years ago already Dr. Pfeiffer expressed it clearly enough: when the limit of organic substance falls below 2% in a given soil, this soil begins living on its reserves. When we talk about the dying soils, it is this law we have to learn to understand first to keep the soil alive. For institutions (which struggle for statutes for their members) the examination of the organic substance is an infallible sign if the farmer changing over is trying to improve his soil. Official agencies can take this examination as a secure evidence.

continued...

ACRES U.S.A. Your contributions to environmental studies have rated attention internationally. From the mass of evidence you’ve presented one would think some of the controversies would have been swept under the rug in Europe. Yet the misquotes and misunderstandings persist. Why?

LUEBKE. A good question. Well, in 1971 the environmental agency in Baden-Wuerttemberg had a study done by the Dornierwerke in Friedrichshafen. They were supposed to come up with Recommendations for an Overall Program of Urgency for the Environmental Protection in Baden-Wuerttemberg. The experts presented 13,000 singular informations, a result of 50,000 computations. The report suggested that agriculture played one of the biggest parts in damaging the environment and that its damaging capacity possibly was surpassing that of the industries. This discussion understandably led to a very fierce debate among the representatives of the various professional groups and these recommendations were being handed back to the Dornier company for revision because the farmers’ association had protested. The head of the commission then led us to understand that there would not be the slightest change possible. This is another example how the various professional groups don’t see the slightest reason to work together in the face of our environmental crises for the reason of their often contrary interests. The examples also lead to the conclusion that the officials only see reason to intervene when the damage has become so large that it cannot be overlooked anymore, or when the public demands intervention by the governmental agencies by way of open protest marches. Then laws are being brought into effect, the wrong though is not being eliminated. Whoever gets caught will be prosecuted and punished. And all the old things keep on in the same way—secretly now. You just cannot be caught at it.

ACRES U.S.A. What did the Dornier report say?

LUEBKE. I studied those papers very carefully. Then I copied the papers 50 times and sent copies to all addresses in government agencies and ministeries I knew of. I received merely two replies, one from the head of the Lebensmittelversuchungsanstalt [Agency for the Examination of Food], and the second one from the Ministery of Commerce, by the then undersecretary of state Anneliese Albrecht. She thanked us for the “interesting papers.” Later on she was to give thanks for this development by declaring it—the new organic movement—a fraud. This declaration was made on TV together with a leading politician in our province, whereby TV used a picture of our market stall as a backdrop. Yet onesided statements such as the minister made are often triggered by the way we see farmers go about a changeover to organic farming. They take it too easy, either out of ignorance or for reasons of mere self interest. They never reckon with official controls. It is my opinion that the government agencies have the right to bring light into the various occurrences in the interest of the public and that it is their duty to do it and to do it in a correct manner. But in this case the minister who was responsible for the consumer pricing and who had been “informed” by the press, threw everything into one pot. Incidents like these made us more and more realize that we stood alone with our efforts. In the meantime the head of the Lebensmitelstelle [Office for Food] had many samples of vegetables tested for nitrate. The results of these tests showed that many kinds of vegetables showed high levels of nitrate. These results were published by the press, a very willing press at that. The journalists claimed that the nitrate levels were highest in vegetables grown on soils with high humus. I was forced to assume that this man was ignorant. He did not distinguish between fertilization with raw manure and fertilization with compost, and he labelled them both as humus. Many still do this today unknowingly. Up to this point in time we had continuously tested our vegetables for nitrate levels, comparing our samples with those of conventional origins. So I started the counterattack and sent a number of samples to Vienna to the Lebensmittel-forschungsstelle [Agency for Food]. Plus at the request of the agency we continued sending further samples during the various stages of growth. In the meantime official negotiations were underway to set a limit for the nitrate content. It was decided to set two different limits: one for the conventional agriculture and one for the up and coming organic farming. The results of these tests showed that the level of nitrates in our vegetables was far below even the one allowed for the organic produce. After that I wanted to contact the journalist in question in order to ask him to correct his statements which made the public uneasy. I was not able to establish this contact, but a colleague tried to clear the matter with the boss and to arrange for a correction of the statements. After being put on hold on the phone for some time I received the answer. No one is allowed to do that. And at that time one really was not. I knew who was behind all this, and I knew all the counter movements. It was not our task and intention to politicize nor to polemicize. Our intention was to put credible facts onto the table. We knew the instigators who resisted the new movements. Many of them find themselves now in a leading role in the new movement, reading the wishes from the public’s eye, that something has to be done, that it cannot go on like this. Fulfilling the public’s wishes they are sure of the votes in the next election. It is the sign of many politicians that they turn their sails to the wind in order to get use out of it. This is the case all over the globe. And all of them had instructions in who the statesman Socrates was. We will need statesmen in the future because politicians are seemingly unable to solve these necessary tasks. In the meantime we believe we have established something valid and unique with our cesium studies.

THE INSTRUMENTS

In order to achieve direct testing at the root zone, it was necessary to find instruments that enabled us to do rapid testing and which also guaranteed that this testing could be done with utmost precision, said Luebke We strived for this kind of testing because the comparison between the test results of the laboratory and direct testing in the field showed that some of the results of the laboratory were altered by time and procedures. We used the following instruments for testing at the root zone:

1. Temperature recorder, together with the...
2. CO2 Infrared measuring instrument;
3. Oxygen measuring instrument;
4. pH-meter and the...
5. SST, the Soil Solution Tubes in which we created a vacuum with the help of the “NALGE” handpump. The SST tubes have a ceramic tip with a pore diameter of 1.5. mu. Through the vacuum created in the tubes the soil moisture diffuses when extracted from the root of the plant. This contains the microbially produced nutrients pulled into this Soil Solution Tube. We are able to determine the microbially produced nutrients immediately with the Photometer. We use the Merck Photometer for this because it comes equipped with an additional battery operation which makes it suitable for use in the field. The test results are then being compared with the various Schnellmess-Streifen [rapid test strips]—also from Merck—and the resulting values could be compared with each other without difficulty. We had worked towards these techniques for testing (test methods) very purposefully after a systematic search in the libraries for the works of American scientists/researchers like Thornton, Spurway, Truog Morgan etc. We studied and examined their methods; for those who are striving to understand the future of agriculture it is also a prerequisite to take into consideration the knowledge of the past.

Measuring the pH

Said Luebke — When we began our work on the improvement of the soil we conducted the tests for the pH with the usual laboratory procedures — the same as is still customary now — to calculate an average from 20 to 30 samples per acre. This produces misleading and false results. In order to study the crumb structure we started to look at the various soil profiles separately and to analyze them separately, and to test each and every one of the layers separately for its pH. The results showed great variations, especially with poor soils. At the beginning we were really struggling for an explanation for these differences. Our next step was to study the effects of the different methods of soil cultivation. We did this with our own soils as well as with the soil of other farmers. We came to the conclusion that with their mechanical cultivation, with the use of the machines, they mixed up the various layers in the soil thoughtlessly. As a logical consequence it is not to be expected that the pH tests yield precise results. For example, it was the case that in one and the same field of 21/2 acres there was a fluctuation in pH of 4.7 to 8.3. The mystified owner of this field showed us the pH results of a test by government agencies. This official test showed a pH of 6.2 and the consultant told him that the pH was “good and in order.” Then the farmer added that exactly at the various spots where we had measured a low pH the problem had been the greatest. He had discussed these problem spots with the consultant. The response had been to have the nutrients tested in these spots — that there was no connection between the pH and the problems. We had acquired highly precise instruments and started testing the pH directly on location in the field. In order to avoid discrepancies, it was necessary to use these precision instruments. They show only small deviations of 0.03 to 0.06 pH. This enabled us to determine the pH of the various soil layers exactly. We had to draw the conclusion that with the large differences in the structure of the various soil layers the laboratory results of pH tests constituted the pH of a product of disintegration and often, did not correspond with the actual conditions in nature We have double checked and proved this again and again in many experiments over the years. Thus we started to build up a homogeneous layer of top soil with humus to the extent that pH values were the same from the top soil zone down to 30 cm [24 inches]. It is possible to achieve this result with a purposeful improvement of the soil which also makes many problems disappear—and also the possibility for many misintepretations. The researcher Morgan tried to emulate the conditions of the microbial metabolic process in his tests and he aimed for the Naehrlcesung [test solution] to correspond with these conditions. We started out with the assumption that the pH in the root zone must be weakly acid. We have checked this in many tests and have found it to be correct in only part of the cases. Our picture illustrates this: the pH taken directly in the root zone is 7.47, and this result constitutes the actual value. The pH varies according to temperature, to the state of Umsetzung [microbial metabolism], to moisture, to the content of oxygen, to the kind of organic matter worked into the soil and other parameters which can never be recorded in the laboratory if the pH is solely determined by laboratory testing. We aired heavy, compacted soils whereby we measured the pH before and after the aeration. The values before and after the aeration usually did not correspond. So it is highly advisable to not create statistical artifacts by testing the pH in the laboratory and playing statistical games. The pH varies according to the respective life activities and these cannot be measured in an abstract test in the laboratory without recognizing the interrelationships of the life activities. On top of this there is always the likelihood that the pH measured in the root zone varies between different kinds of plants. We are continuing these experiments.