Soil matters with Peter Burton Functional Fertiliser Ltd

It’s surprisingly easy, just ask for the performance data. Farmers have a right to know what their fertiliser inputs will deliver, and every company selling products has an obligation to provide sound data.

Simply because it’s what ‘everyone does’ doesn’t necessarily make it the most effective option, or even ensure a product is fit for purpose. 

The largest fertiliser companies spend the most on research and development and should therefore have the best data, but do they?

Science is based on measures, and when it comes to soil fertility only systematic and accurate figures are good enough.

Without sound long-term measures there can be no reasoned discussion, and any attempt to get to the truth quickly descends into a “he said, you said” farce, or a condescending put-down.

A high school teacher, many years ago, regularly finished a lesson with: “Boys, if you don’t understand, ask; it’s better to look a fool than to be one”. And that’s been an integral part of how I’ve worked ever since.

Cadmium

The New Zealand phosphate-based fertiliser industry has worked on sourcing and applying essential nutrient at the lowest cost per kilogram of nutrient, which was fine when there was a plentiful supply of suitable resource with low levels of heavy metals.

As the supply of suitable phosphorus became scarcer and more expensive, the least cost rock was that unwanted by many countries due to its levels of cadmium. There are now large areas of this country not suitable for vegetable production due to unacceptably high levels of cadmium.

It’s essential product available to NZ farmers is fit for purpose, not right now but in the future when environmental and product quality standards are even tighter.

The argument that it doesn’t matter in what form product is applied to the land looks increasingly naive, as our understanding of soil being a living breathing organism grows.

Early research in this country on beneficial earthworms under pasture showed a significant increase in numbers when lime was applied, and this was attributed to the calcium content of lime.

Aglime generally contains around 30 per cent calcium. Phosphate rock used for superphosphate contains a similar amount. However no-one argues that superphosphate applied at 1-2tonne/ha, the rate at which lime is generally applied, will have the same beneficial effect on soil earthworm numbers.

Sequestering carbon

There’s a lot more to soil fertility than its chemistry based on the analysis of a bagful of 75mm cores. It’s a useful part of the picture, and a lot more information is required before a beneficial fertiliser programme can be formulated. 

It’s essential for the long-term survival of pastoral farming that soils are actively sequestering carbon. As there is no static position, soils are either losing or gaining carbon, and the present situation – where most of our soils are steadily losing carbon – must be addressed.

To not do so means the pastoral farming industry, as we know it today, will cease to exist within the next 25 years. 

Fortunately, there is the technology, supported by data, to show an increase in soil carbon under intensively grazed pasture is not only achievable; it’s actually inevitable, turning pastoral farming from an environmentally negative activity to one that is positive in every respect.

However it’s not just about adding carbon. Carbon and nitrogen are linked and when carbon accumulates and remains in a semi-digested state such as dense thatch, or peat, nutrient cycling slows to a point where pastoral farming becomes financially non-viable.

By creating the conditions, and the necessary fungi and bacteria populations in the soil whereby carbon from dung, dead grass, and old root matter is rapidly digested, it becomes a repository for nutrients which are then available along with nitrogen for plant uptake.

Water is able to percolate downwards leaving behind both nitrogen and phosphorus for further plant growth. It’s the way healthy natural systems are designed to operate, and the key to the efficiency is creating the conditions that favour beneficial fungi and bacteria.

These systems devised by Functional Fertiliser have now been in place on an increasing number of properties throughout the country for 15 years, and may be implemented at any time during the year with no loss in annual pasture production.  For more information, call Peter on 0800 843 809.