[Terrapreta] Purity of the list topic & 2 questions

[Roy Lent]

I hear the same subject here as I've heard in many other lists, should we
limit the list to strictly on topic messages or not. Should we say that the
only subject that can be treated is TP with no exceptions? That seems
foolish. The care of soil can involve remineralization using igneous rock
dust or even sea water. It certainly involves compost applications and can
necessitate aplications of limestone or other natural materials to control
pH. All these things are related to TP and the application of char.

If we take a completely infertile clay subsoil and add charcoal to it I
doubt if we would see any significant effect as to its fertility. But if we
were to add rock dust, compost and such to it also, the effect should be
greater that it would be without the char. The addition of certain strains
of microorganisms could be included here too.

On the other hand messages on the list dealing with fashion or the Oort
Cloud in space would be almost impossible to connect up to the topic
subject.

I have two questions that deal directly with TP that someone just might have
answers to:

1. Is it possible that low grade lignite coal could give the same TP effect
in soil that charcoal does?

2. Is TP more effective in wet tropical soils than in temperate soils?
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