[Terrapreta] biochar and alkaline soils

Thu May 17 12:17:11 CDT 2007

To all,

If I remember correctly (sometimes that's a long shot), I think that I
read that ash is what increases the ph in soil more than the charcoal
although charcoal does provide some increase in ph. I can't remember
where but it was suggested that washing the charcoal to remove the ash
would minimize the ph problem of to much alkalinity. Of course that
would work best with high temperature char that burns off many or most
of the impurities. High temperature char also has more pores and surface
area probably because the impurities in the original materials cells
have been turned to gas and burnt off. So the sugar cane field problems
and high ph are most likely due to the ash that has accumulated over the
years.

Randy Black

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Today's Topics:

   1. Re: biochar and alkaline soils (Michael Bailes)

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

Message: 1
Date: Fri, 18 May 2007 02:10:32 +1000
From: "Michael Bailes" <michaelangelica at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Terrapreta] biochar and alkaline soils
To: adkarve <adkarve at pn2.vsnl.net.in>, 	terrapreta
	<terrapreta at bioenergylists.org>
Message-ID:
	<7dcba7be0705170910l60a00aa1y9c09efe74a0aa1f at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

Sugarcane needs an acid soil; 8 is way too high for optimal growth.

> "the optimum pH for sugar cane is about 6.5
 Yates 1978"
>
http://www.alfredhartemink.nl/PDF/1998%20-%20Sugar%20cane%20PNG.pdf

High soil pH can cause deficiencies.

> "Plants such as maize and sorghum and sugarcane shows reduced
> photosynthetic carbon metabolism due to zinc deficiency."
> The solubility of zinc is highly dependent upon soil pH. Presence of
> calcium carbonate decreases the availability of zinc due to higher
soil pH.
>
http://www.spraygro.com.au/documents/Zincnutrition.pdf

Lack of SOM could also be a problem
http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:h0t2xhfiMAwJ:www.daff.gov.au/corpora
te_docs/publications/word/sugar_assessment/art.doc+optimum+soil+pH+for+s
ugarcane&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=8&gl=au&client=firefox-a

There are some newly discovered nitrogen fixing bacteria for sugarcane.
See:
http://www.springerlink.com/content/g1672n6225871028/

Burning cane residues gives you very,very little charcoal.
Ploughing it into the soil as SOM may be a better option?

adkarve <adkarve at pn2.vsnl.net.in> wrote:

> but after reading that biochar might not work in alkaline soils,

No one has actually said or  proved that yet. We are still kicking the
ball
around the paddock.Without much research to help
.It would be nice if all charcoal researchers gave a detailed chemical
run
down (including pH) of exactly what they are using when they say
"Charcoal"
,
 Different chars may have different pHs.
We are still unsure of the role of resins and bio oils on pH
 Char's effects on soil may also change quite quickly over time
(months),
then settle down for the long 10,000 year haul..
 It is always possible that charcoal normalises pH !
It seems to do 100 other impossible things before lunch; so why not
that?.

m

On 18/05/07, adkarve <adkarve at pn2.vsnl.net.in> wrote:
>
>  I live in India, in Masharashtra state, that produces 40% of the
total
> sugar in India. We have had sugar factories since the early 1930s. All
the
> sugarcane is manually harvested. Typically, a hectare of sugarcane
produces
> about 10 tonnes of dry leaves, so that after the harvest is over, the
field
> is covered with a layer of dry leaves that is often 30 cm thick.
Farmers
> just burn the leaves to clear the field. The charred leaves and ash
are then
> ploughed into the soil. Farmers do not grow consecutive crops of
sugarcane
> but always rotate it with other crops. About 50 years ago, there were
many
> farmers who harvested more than 200 tonnes of sugarcane per ha and the
> average of the state in the 1960s was 100 tonnes per ha. But then
yield
> started declining. The average has now come down to about 80 tonnes
per ha
> and one hardly meets a farmer who harvests more than 150 tonnes per
ha. The
> soil in the sugarcane area is vertisol, having a pH ranging from 8.2
to
> 8.7. I am not saying that incorporation of char and ash caused decline
in
> sugarcane yield. There might be entirely other reasons for it, but
after
> reading that biochar might not work in alkaline soils, one is tempted
to
> come to this conclusion.
>
> Yours
>
> A.D.Karve
>
<http://bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/terrapreta_bioenergylists.or
g>
>
>

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