Thanks, Hugh, You and I know this, but Randy has 50 acres of trees that he is feeding with $9000 worth of slow release chemical fertilizer which he says is the best he's ever had. How can I tell him that it is no good. It's just the ponderosa pines that aren't happy and another variety that was completely killed by a root/stem girdling larva. I may try to email him with your information anyway. I'll have to work myself up to it.
Best, Merla Hugh Lovel wrote: > Dear Merla, > > One thing it seems Randy may not know is that when plants get their nitrogen as >salts, their protoplasm hasn't any choice but to be salty and watery. This stretches >their cell walls and leads to poor cell density and insect damage. When they get >their nitrogen as amino acids they make far more long chain amino acids--which >insects cannot digest--and the insects leave them alone. And their cell density is >greater so they are less susceptible to diseases. > > The question is how to get the trees to get all their nitrogen as amino acids >instead of salts such as urea, nitrates, ammonia, etc.? The answer is to get >mycorhyzae and azotobacters working in the soil and colonizing the trees roots from >the day they are planted. A good compost tea program as well as a field broadcaster >would be a good recipe. Has Randy heard about Elaine Ingham? Does he need a field >broadcaster brochure? He really sounds like a good sort and maybe he is open to these >things. > > Best, > Hugh > > Your nemesis, Randy, seem to exemplify many good, as well as misguided, >qualities. His land is in his family and farming is in his blood. He is open enough >to share with you what he is doing and he really believes in it, works hard, makes it >pay, pays his bills thereby, etc. He uses a spider and cover crops, for crying out >loud. > > I was surprised at how much I liked his place, but it bothered me, I guess >because it wasn't a small farm growing vegetables organically, but rather just large >fields of beautiful perfect trees, exactly spaced...little monocultures of various >tree species planted and harvested in different years.� It might be valuable to >compare an organic tree farm with Randy's farm.� I got the invitation to come via the >Weed Supervisor who is trying his hardest to produce harmony among the disparate >elements on the Weed Committee.� I jumped at the chance to contribute to that.� In >some way, his spread reminded me of the way you have many different crops planted in >a kind of patchwork to accommodate the shape of your land.�� I have French intensive >beds so that is quite different.� There was much good in his work, and I hope this is >a beginning of shared respect.� My husband tells me he heard Randy bragging about how >he and some other farmers sneaked onto an organic neighbor's land who > wouldn't take care of his weeds and sprayed it with herbicide...I guess it's >his personality, not necessarily his farm.� Maybe the fact that we are taking care of >weeds on our IPM road project is a start to help him to relax.� I am a threat to a >long-standing culture of chemicals.� If I can just get all the tansy, knapweed, >thistle and hawkweed off Rapid Lightning Road, maybe he will respect me.� There is >zero tolerance for "noxious" weeds and everything has to be oriented toward making a >profit.� My political values are so different. > > Taking a page out of our native son, Jimmy Carter's book, appreciate his good >points and simply acknowledge his shortcomings. That keeps the exchange going and you >can discuss little things that might lead to bigger and better things. It's a >non-judgmental, step-wise approach, and admittedly it doesn't always work. But >sometimes it produces astounding results. > > I agree.� I'm going to try and I appreciate Brad, the Weed Supervisor's efforts >to help find something in common between the chemical proponents and the >environmentalists.� I have mellowed out a lot in my approach.� I'm demonstrating >non-chemical methods and taking care of weeds.� I'm keeping confidences when I could >write letters to the editor in the local paper blasting various problems I see.� >Right now I'm quite troubled about the residue in the sediment of a broad spectrum >herbicide, diquat dibromide, that was put in the lake for Eurasian watermilfoil.� >This has nothing to do with Randy.� It was the Public Works Director's baby and he is >extremely sensitive if I raise any questions about any problems or about the high >cost of hiring out-of-state applicators and divers to protect drinking water >inlets...Oh God! > > The bare soil really bugs you? Well around here grasses and clovers in the >Christmas tree orchard is the only way it is done. This involves mowing, but still it >pays back in moisture and nutrient retention, because as long as the level of biology >is kept up in the soil, living organisms keep these things inside their cell walls >where they are not so easily lost. > > Is there some reason he keeps it bare? Does he know that in other places such >plantations all grow grass? Has he been observant of what happens to his soil and the >living organisms that support it when it spends several years bare? > > He did explain why he keeps it bare.� He pointed to some trees on his next door >neighbor's land which hadn't been kept bare, but had had lots of tansy that Randy >finally sprayed Escort for him when the trees were dormant.� He commented that it had >affected the growth of the bottom branches and they didn't look good.� He did have >hard fescue on interior roads between large beds on another piece of land that he >bought later.� He expected it to fill in completely and keep out weeds.� Since he had >that large sawdust/urea compost pile, he may be using that as a mulch.� He would >never plant clover.� It would have to be grass to stand the herbicide spraying.� He >really believed that the trees grew better on bare soil. > > There was insect damage which means that his chemical fertilizer isn't giving >some varieties of trees, especially the native ones, what they want.� I will probably >ask him about that.� He could decide to approach the native trees organically with >soil and organisms just like untouched native soil, but how would he get fast >growth?� Maybe it's not possible to treat native species like the blue spruces he >raises from seed from blue trees with a long history of being grown on a tree farm. > > It is always better to ask questions than to give information. This is quite >interesting. Education has come to mean, particularly in our public schools, >informing people. But if you look at its root, educare, this means to draw out. In >older times they knew that true education was a process of drawing out of people the >realizations that go beyond mere information. > > I am going to write a thank you email and I will ask some more questions.� >Thanks for your suggestions. > > Merla � > > � > > Visit our website at: www.unionag.org
