[Terrapreta] Terra Preta and Ants

[Gerald Van Koeverden]

Is the ant-repellant nature of TP soils permanent?  I find it hard to  
believe that ants. or at least some species, haven't overcome this  
over time...or does it wear off with time?  Has anybody who has  
studied TP soils in situ made any observations on this issue??

What about termites??

Gerrit


On 13-Dec-07, at 12:06 PM, Saibhaskar Nakka wrote:

>
> Dear All,
>
>
> After the successful field trials in Alkaline soils http://e- 
> alkalinesoilsterrapreta.blogspot.com/ , I have just started second  
> season TP experiments on a small scale on our Roof top in small  
> pots http://e-terrapretarooftopexp.blogspot.com/. The charcoal is  
> exclusively from use of Magh-1 woodgas or smoke burner stove http:// 
> e-smokeburnerstove.blogspot.com/ designed by me. I would like to  
> share some of my immediate observations.
>
> One day after establishing pots and the seed with soil and charcoal  
> and only soil. I have sowed brinjal seeds in the 6 with charcoal +  
> soil and 6 only soil. To my surprise I saw that in the three  
> control pots the seeds were eaten away by small red ants. The six  
> pots with a mix of about 30% charcoal were untouched by ants. In TP  
> practice the chances of germination of the seed with out any loss  
> to creatures like ants is minimized. I thought this is the first  
> direct benefit of using charcoal. On day two I saw that all the  
> pots without charcoal are with small red ants. There is not a  
> single ant in the pot with charcoal addition.
>
> Although I love ants, to avoid ants eating away the seeds sown, we  
> could always add some charcoal along with the seeds. Second  
> important application is that in the Vermicompost pits some ants  
> eat away the earthworms to avoid such problem and for value  
> addition to the compost to create a habitat for microbes, we could  
> as well add charcoal.
>
> From web I learnt that those you want to avoid toxic chemicals are  
> using charcoal and diatomous earth as a repellant for ants. For  
> photographs please see the blog below.
>
> http://e-terrapretarooftopexp.blogspot.com/
>
> I would like to know from your experiences what could be the other  
> impacts in using Charcoal to the living things existing in soil.
>
>
> Dr. N. Sai Bhaskar Reddy
>
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