Giver of Life - Healthy Soils

By Denice Rackley

Soil is the giver of life, the connector between plants and the nutrients that sustain life. Healthy soils provide the fuel and water, enabling plants to live and grow. When soils are unhealthy, they not only lack the specific ingredients that plants need, but also lack the ability to hold water keeping it within reach of the plant.

Being rooted in place has its disadvantages. If our existence were totally dependent on items within our reach, our lives would be vastly different. To thrive, withstanding stressors like heat, wind, floods, snowstorms, we would want to be rooted in an ideal location. Not sure about you, but I would choose a spot right next to a well-stocked refrigerator.

Healthy soils are the ‘refrigerators’, food and water storage, for plants.

Components of soil health

We hear people speak of soil health, but do we really understand the term? Soil health is the optimal combination of chemical, physical and biological processes that enable soils to support life. 

More than just clay, silt, or sand, soils are living, diverse ecosystems. Healthy soils should be one-half solid materials (clay, silt, sand, minerals, nutrients, organic material, and biological life) and the other half pores. The pores are space for air and water within the soil. The biological life within soils and their interaction with roots produce the ‘glue’ which maintains soil structure keeping pore spaces open.

Organic matter fuels the microbial life that’s crucial in forming stable groups of soil particles or aggregates and maintaining a porous structure from the surface too deep within the ground. 

Water infiltration, air exchange, and root penetration are all possible because of this porous structure. When pores are clogged or are compacted, water runs off rather than into soil, air exchange is slowed, and roots have trouble penetrating the soil.

Improving Soil Health

Soil health is improved by adding organic matter, increasing biodiversity, and keeping soils covered.

Cover Soil

Keeping soils covered protects them from the impact of sun, wind, and rain. Covering provides the soil with armor, maintaining the soil structure and preventing topsoil erosion. 

Soil particles are ‘splashed away’, moved by rain unless the soil has some vegetative cover. These splashed particles clog the soil pores, sealing off the soil surface.

Open pores allow water to infiltrate the soil, holding the water until it’s needed. The problem is open pores also allow evaporation. That is where keeping the soils covered is again important.

Mulches, crop residue, grasses, shrubs, and trees do an excellent job of protecting soils from direct sunlight, reducing heat, and minimizing evaporation. Have you ever noticed the extra grass growth along the wooded edges of pastures?  Keeping soils cool promotes continued growth. 

Cover crops also provide a beneficial covering, but the plant’s roots hold secrets we are just starting to understand.    

Maintain Soil Structure and Support Microbial Life 

Connecting plants to the microbial life underground roots provide the pathway for this vital interaction. 

Soil contains 8 to 15 tons of bacteria, fungi, protozoa, nematodes, earthworms, and arthropods. Roots provide microbes both nutrients and a home. In turn, these microbes repackage soil nutrients into forms readily available to plants, build organic matter, store unused nutrients, and maintain the porous structure of soil.  

Decreasing tillage keeps microbial homes intact, enabling the microbes to continue working undisturbed. The top inches of soil store more water and erosion is reduced when the soil structure isn't disturbed.  

Above Ground Plant Health Linked to Below Ground Health 

The health of plants above the ground gives us an indication of what is happening below ground. As long as plants are growing their roots continue to grow which positively impacting the soil and all life below ground.  

Healthy plants have healthy, thriving root systems that continually feed the soil microbiology. Plants that are overgrazed cause the root systems deteriorate as well.   

Over grazing is not limited to harming one plant; it disrupts the soil microbiology and impacts the entire system.

Rotational grazing can be a very effective tool in managing soil health and biodiversity. Plants are maintained in the vegetative state and continue to grow when livestock are moved through a pasture, not allowed to continually eat the same plants. Soils are fed by the addition of organic matter in the form of urine and manure. Soils also benefit stems and excess forage trampled into the soil. 

We do know that diversity above-ground benefits life underground. Cover crops can add the needed diversity to crop fields and pastures while also addressing the soil’s and producer’s specific needs. Legumes add nitrogen, brassicas suppress fungal pathogens and promote disease-suppressive bacteria. Cover crops with large single roots like radishes and turnips break us compaction, grasses with complex roots systems hold soils preventing erosion.   

“Treating cover crops with the same respect as your main crop will enable you to benefit from all the advantages cover crops can bring to your operation,” says Sam Sandoval, associate professor UC Davis.  

Cover crops have great potential to soak up excess winter and spring rains, provide erosion control, reduce the need for tillage since they control weeds, and break up compacted soils while providing nutrients and organic matter. 

Add Organic Matter 

While cover crops add organic matter to soils as they decompose, using compost as soil amendment adds organic matter quickly.

Compost, whether commercially obtained or made on the farm, can be added to the soils as dry matter or even injected into garden and field irrigation systems as liquids. However, the easiest way to add natural fertilizer over a large area is with grazing livestock. 

Livestock manure and urine deposited by grazing livestock provide readily available nutrients while stomping down more vegetative matter in the soil. The natural slow release of nutrients from composts and manure gives crops, forages, and microbes a boost.

Fueling increased production, compost provides low-cost organic material that results in high returns. Not only does organic matter contain needed nutrients, it also has a direct impact on the water holding capacity of soils.

The USDA believes each acre of soil can hold an additional 27,000 gallons of water with every 1% increase in soil organic matter. There is no better way to increase the water readily available to plants than by adding organic matter. 

Healthy soil holds more water 

Keeping soils covered prevents erosion and evaporation, preserving moisture. Plant diversity, growing root systems, and active microbes result in healthy soils that maintain their porous structure. Adding organic matter to soils provides the fuel needed to run the entire system and the glue that holds it all together.  

Healthy Soils rich in organic matter resist compaction and have an increased water holding capacity which translates into the ability to make every drop of water count.  

Not every location is as water rich as others. Drought is a serious problem for many ag producers. Practicing healthy soil management techniques along with applying the best irrigation strategies could reduce water use by 10 to 20% says Sandoval.

Do you realize with every step, you are walking on the rooftop of another world?? 

Viewing soils as living entities puts a different spin on agriculture. Beneath your feet, there is more life in a small patch of soil than on the entire earth above ground.  

Practicing intentional agriculture, maintaining the vast diversity of life in our soils while continually feeding soils with the addition of organic material, leads to healthy soils that produce nutritious food and are resilient while maintaining and storing large quantities of two of our most precious resources – top soil and water.