Strategy: Inoculate!
If you are new to this, start here.
Strategy
Best practices include incorporating beneficial biological communities into compost by inoculating.
Start with a mother culture
Essentially, you would like to start out with a mother culture of clean healthy product. A small manageable compost pile with material that is completely free from any toxic chemical like herbicide or fungicide. This mother culture should be carefully nurtured and maintained to use as a base from which a bigger compost pile can be inoculated and eventually the windrows of manure compost. These windrows can then be applied to fields at rates of a few tons per acre.
Build diversity into the mother culture
It’s beneficial to have a broad diversity of species in the mother culture pile, such as probiotics like Lactobacillus. One example of such a probiotic is the same live fermenting culture that is found in sauerkraut: the Lactobacillus family of species, or even sourdough bread yeasts. These cultures can be multiplied and accelerated in such a way that it can be applied to a larger pile as an inoculant. A food source such as molasses can be included with the inoculant as it is applied. These beneficial communities then multiply and accelerate throughout the pile or windrow.
Inoculating fields in winter
Biological inoculants or extracts can be added to fields even during the winter as a pre-season application. Even if the biological communities are in a state of dormancy, it can still be beneficial because they will eventually wake up. When the temperature fluctuates during the winter, in a freeze and thaw cycle this functions as a capillary action that mimics breathing like rising and falling of the chest and lungs. Therefore, the opening and closing of air channels in the soil helps to move oxygen, moisture, nutrients, and biology into soil.
The soil food web
When a thriving ecosystem and environment is present in the way that the Creator designed it to be, there are multiple different species, organisms, and trophic levels represented. When these various communities are allowed to be present in a balanced way this creates a community known as the soil food web. One of the greatest advantages of having all the beneficial communities present, is the ability to cycle nutrients throughout the root zone. When nutrients are able to be broken down from decomposing plant matter and recycled in such a way that they are then available for uptake by roots of plants. A plant can use its rhizosheath to shift its own pH zone in order to access mineral nutrition.
The fungal to bacterial ratio
When crop residue breaks down there are two forms of material: green carbon including living plant tissues and brown carbon composed of dead and decaying materials. As these two forms of material begin decomposing there are two major categories of microbes represented. These are fungal and bacterial elements. This is usually referred to as a ratio known as F:B. The fungal to bacterial ratio is a measure of what proportion of the microbial community is bacterial compared to what proportion is fungal. A higher fungal proportion is usually more desirable as it is more conducive to be able to assist in the nutrient cycling ability of breaking down crop residue and moving the units to be available to the plant roots. In the same way, as plant residues break down there are acids present known as fulvics and humics. In soils with higher bacterial communities usually there are more fulvic acids. Humic and fungal dominant soils are typically more desirable for a healthy crop setting. In order to make nitrogen fertilizer the most effective it should be paired with and buffered by humic acid.
Strong fungal communities are necessary to decompose lignin and cellulose from crop residues. A good food source for fungal compost is chips from soft woods.
Compost teas and extracts
Finished compost can be used to make a liquid that can be applied to soils or plants by creating tea or extracts from concentrated compost material. A tea is typically brewed or steeped simply by immersing the concentrated product in water. The water soluble biological particles are then freed up and put into suspension in liquid form allowing it to be applied by spraying. Typically an extract is better than a tea because of efficiency at scale. Extracted materials can be thought of as stronger concentrate.
Seed treatment
When seeds are treated with beneficial microbial communities, this inoculation can help a seed get past the die-off zone that is critical at the beginning of plant life. When plants begin to grow they are desperate for nutrients which forces them to make longer roots as they are going deeper and wider in the root zone. This is beneficial because with more roots a plant has greater potential to absorb nutrients and moisture. As these seeds grow they are protected and given a head start by the beneficial microbial communities in the treatment. At this point it becomes critical to nurture and maintain these communities by trying to reduce or eliminate fungicides.
Composting, not rotting
There is a difference between composting and rotting. Composting is a system that is managed in such a way that the bacterial to fungal ratios are balanced in order to create an environment that is conducive towards nutrient cycling. Thermophilic compost is a method which uses the natural heat and gasses to kill off weed seeds between 135–165 degrees. When compost exceeds this temperature and gets between 165–180 it can produce methane and alcohol which burns off root hairs and becomes detrimental to microbial communities and biology. Another key aspect which must be carefully maintained is the oxygen within the compost pile. If there is not enough oxygen present the pile can become anaerobic which means the organisms are starved of oxygen and cannot breathe. Such an environment will usually become bacteria dominant and will be nasty, stinky, and rotting.
Methods of composting
Three different types of composting are: thermophilic (using heat in a controlled way), vermicomposting (using worms), and Johnson-Su (using a bioreactor for a long period of time to create a fungal dominant product).
In the Johnson-Su method after the initial spike of hot compost the temperature is brought back down to 80 degrees, and worms are added and left alone for up to a year in order for mycelium to develop and colonize the pile.
The SPICE Composting method (developed by Gerry Gillespie) uses a simple no-turn technique to achieve an effective composting process. Instead of turning the compost regularly to add air (aeration), the compost pile is inoculated with specialized microbes, then covered and left to decompose without the need of turning. This is why it is also known as Fermentative Composting.
Local indigenous micro-organisms
Beneficial minerals and nutrients can also be found in many natural products like kelp and seashells. Other beneficial microbial communities can be found and harvested in any local indigenous location in the world. These communities are present where there are undisturbed areas with native plants, shrubs, and trees. Specimens of local indigenous micro-organisms can be collected. Collecting native soil from wild forest areas is a natural farming technique.
These collections can be made by using a special substrate to bait fungal communities or by uprooting a plant and observing the rhizosheath and collecting the biology present by rinsing the roots off into a bucket of water. The bigger mineral particles are screened off and the water soluble biology is collected and used to create cultures which are added to compost piles and windrows. It is critical to preserve wild spaces and habitat for native species that can be used as collection places.
If you want to go deeper
Read through the notes on humic content in vermicompost, then have a look at the photographs on the front page —
When you are working on something specific and want a second opinion, get in touch.