[Terrapreta] Terra Preta - not just about charcoal in soil

[Sean K. Barry]

Hi Elliot,

Thanks for this post.  I'll read it in the morning.  You've made it sound like this might be a pertinent study to what we are discussing.

Actinorhyzal plants + charcoal works better ? ...

Regards,

SKB
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Elliot<mailto:efnews at gmail.com> 
  To: Terrapreta<mailto:terrapreta at bioenergylists.org> 
  Sent: Wednesday, October 03, 2007 11:17 PM
  Subject: Re: [Terrapreta] Terra Preta - not just about charcoal in soil


  Hi All,

  While I am no expert agronomist it appears that N can be adversely
  locked up by bacterial action due to char addition. An interesting
  paper on the subject is:

  Biol Fertil Soils (2007) 43:699–708
  Biological nitrogen fixation by common beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.)
  increases with bio-char additions
  Marco A. Rondon, Johannes Lehmann, Juan Ramírez & Maria Hurtado

  This paper shows that when growing 2 similar bean species, one very
  symbiotic with N fixating bacteria, one not, the yields and N
  availability to the plant differed significantly. basically any
  significant char addition caused the non N fixing bean to have WORSE
  yield (due to N deficiency) than no char while the N fixing bean had
  better yields (high N in biomass)... to a point when char was
  'overdosed'.

  Part of the story seemingly missed so far on this thread, and a key
  point in that paper to me was that it seemed to me that the level of
  plant interactivity with soil microbes is key to unlocking the
  resources they have. Clearly one plant was more symbiotic with the N
  fixing bacteria and benefited while the other could not access the N
  soil reserve and was penalised by increase in activity of the N fixing
  soil bacteria.

  My $0.02

  Elliot

  > ----- Original Message -----
  > From: Jon C. Frank
  > To: Terrapreta
  >
  > Sent: Wednesday, October 03, 2007 12:06 PM
  > Subject: Re: [Terrapreta] Terra Preta - not just about charcoal in soil
  >
  >
  > Sean,
  >
  > The application of charcoal powder created an observable nitrogen deficiency
  > in corn plants.  Where is the nitrogen?  I am sure it is still there but
  > unavailable to the plants since microbes get 1st priority on soil nutrients
  > ahead of plants.  Since corn is a nitrogen loving crop, additional nitrogen
  > needed to be applied to compensate for the application of the charcoal.
  >
  > Does charcoal applied to soil cause N to dissipate to the air or cause a
  > reoccurring loss?  In my opinion no--just a short-time (1-2 years) imbalance
  > in the C to N ratio.
  >
  > As far as getting a theory and a test experiment to prove the theory and
  > then see if it is replicated in different locations sorry the answer is the
  > same as last post (No Sean I won't waste my time trying to validate or
  > invalidate the theory).
  >
  > How about you do it Sean?  I have no interest.
  >
  > Jon

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