Summary

 

Improving your soil health and crop performance begins with careful observation and good recordkeeping. If your crops show poor growth, look at the growth environment and take plant tissue samples to see which nutrients your crop may be lacking. Record all soil fertility and plant-tissue test results, along with yields and management practices.
 
Sampling and recordkeeping are musts because they help you assess the agronomic and economic success of your practices over time. Also, these records are required by the NOP. Develop a site-specific, long-term fertility plan based on the characteristics of the soils on that site, the crops in the rotation and the farmer.
 
In building soil health and your long-term fertility plan, taking several approaches is more effective than trying to put all your soil improvement tactics in one basket. Many practices can influence crop response to nutrients. Some of these practices include:
 
•        Timing and type of tillage
•        Planting a hybrid or a particular variety of plant
•        Adjusting your planting dates
•        Using crop rotations, green manures and cover crops
•        Interplanting two or more crops in the same area
•        Incorporating crop residues
•        Subsoiling
•        Adding approved amendments, foliar fertilizers and soil inoculants
 
We'll talk more about these practices in the next lesson.
 

 

 

Timing Is Everything

If your fertility plan includes plant or animal residue application in the fall, you should soil test in the spring, once your microbial community has had a chance to do its thing and make nutrients available. To find out if you need to plant a cover crop to store excess nutrients for the next planting cycle, soil test again after harvest. (Testing should be done at the same times of the year and at similar soil temperatures.)