Dear Jeff, one of the points that is missed in most discussions on earthworms is the fact that earthworms are miniature biogas plants. Ms Hemangi Jambhekar, a lady selling earthworm compost as a business, told me that earthworm casts had unusually high iron content. The soil in our area is rich in iron, but the iron, being Fe2O3(ferric oxide) is not soluble in water and therefore soil analysis shows our soils to be poor in iron. When this soil passes through the gut of an earthworm, the anaerobic micro-organisms in the gut take a part of the oxygen from the Fe2O3 for their own metabolism and convert the Fe2O3 into FeO(ferrous oxide), which is water soluble. Similarly, the casts of worms contain many other organic and inorganic components of the soil in their reduced form. The reduced compounds serve the soil microbes as food, because they can oxidise them to obtain energy for their own metabolism. This causes an increase in the population density of soil microbes. It is a universally accepted fact that the population density of soil microbes is positively correlated to soil fertility. Yours A.D.Karve
On Sun, Sep 28, 2014 at 10:29 PM, Jeff Davis <[email protected]> wrote: > Kind of off topic: > > > Aren't earthworms good for soil and gardens? > > It depends. Earthworms create a soil of a certain consistency. For soils > that are compacted due to heavy use by agriculture and urbanization, for > example, earthworm tunnels can create "macro-pores" to aid the movement of > water through the soil. They also help incorporate organic matter into the > mineral soil to make more nutrients available to plants. However, in > agricultural settings earthworms can also have harmful effects. For > instance, their castings (worm excrement) can increase erosion along > irrigation ditches. In the urban setting, earthworm burrows can cause lumpy > lawns. > > Relative to simplified ecosystems such as agricultural and urban/suburban > soils, earthworm-free hardwood forests in Minnesota have a naturally loose > soil with a thick duff layer. Most of our native hardwood forest tree > seedlings, wildflowers, and ferns grow best in these conditions. However, > when earthworms invade they actually increase the compaction of hardwood > forest soils. Compaction decreases water infiltration. Less infiltration > combined with the removal of the duff and fallen tree leaves results in > increased surface runoff and erosion. > > <http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/invasives/terrestrialanimals/earthworms/index.html> > > > > Jeff > > _______________________________________________ > Gasification mailing list > > to Send a Message to the list, use the email address > [email protected] > > to UNSUBSCRIBE or Change your List Settings use the web page > http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/gasification_lists.bioenergylists.org > > for more Gasifiers, News and Information see our web site: > http://gasifiers.bioenergylists.org/ -- *** Dr. A.D. Karve Trustee & Founder President, Appropriate Rural Technology Institute (ARTI) _______________________________________________ Gasification mailing list to Send a Message to the list, use the email address [email protected] to UNSUBSCRIBE or Change your List Settings use the web page http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/gasification_lists.bioenergylists.org for more Gasifiers, News and Information see our web site: http://gasifiers.bioenergylists.org/
