[Terrapreta] cover cropping as a charcoal in soil evaluation.

[Richard Haard]

Hello Philip
On Jun 15, 2008, at 12:57 PM, Philip Small wrote:

> Richard: Your comparative cover crop (control vs treatment plots)  
> looks like a truly effective way to evaluate long term potential for  
> charcoal. Your results show tremendous differences in dry matter  
> production, the basic unit used to compare biomass production in my  
> world.  Your work demonstrates (better than any others I am aware)  
> of that TP benefits can be achieved outside the classic oxisol/ 
> ultisol.  Congratulations!
>
> You have soil testing results too, if I recall.

Not on this. I do have a baseline pretreatment analysis . The  
intensive sampling is in my block study, some work I started in 2007.

In this project this was indeed my intention if the entire section was  
allowed to pass through cover crop as was planned. What I have now is  
just an interesting indication.
> Those would be of interest to me.  Tissue analysis would be cool  
> also. Beyond the tissue sap brix, which is of interest to many  
> others on the TL list, I would love to see comparative clip-and- 
> weigh data and comparative forage mineral nutrient data.  This lab  
> work is less money than you might think, I know of a very cost  
> effective forage lab which uses near-infrared spectometry. NIR  
> applicability is limited to certain feed types but oats is on their  
> list which means you can get N, Ca, P, Mg, K, S, Cl for $16 plus $4  
> using their pre paid shipping.
>
> Not necessary, your work in pictures stands on its own without those  
> add ons - congrats, again! -philip

I did try a set of leaf tissue analysis in my block study last summer.  
I used the University of Mass soil lab where I do my soil testing.  
Costs are $13 total

  I have 28 trial blocks and the costs add up fast. Those results in  
the first year did not show very much. However in this mustard cover  
crop the differences were dramatic. If I have a chance to do this in  
11 or 12 it will be very interesting.

Rich
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