Connect Soil Health to Your Health With the Agri-Health Culture Conference

This conference was held in early 2020, just before COVID-19 became a household word. The speaker insights are as relevant today as they were then. You can view playbacks on our sister site, at endofite.com. Watch the Playbacks Good Nutrition Begins On Farms and In Gardens.  Hipocrates once recognized food as the best medicine.  Of … Read more

Biostimulants Boost Plant Growth in Brackish Water

Brackish Water is Toxic To Crop Plants About 97% of the fresh water on the earth is considered too brackish (too salty) for most agricultural use.  Desalination, or purification, is of course possible.  Mechanical desalination processes are widely known. But making desalination cost effective and environmentally friendly can be challenging. The National Acadamies tell us … Read more

The Johnson-Su Bioreactor Enriches Beneficial Soil Fungi

Stop Turning Your Compost Composting offers a terrific way to culture native microbes that benefit your soil. However, there is more to a good compost than simply building a pile of manure and yard waste. Proper aeration is important to prevent overheating and to ensure that aerobic bacteria-bacteria that consume oxygen, dominate the mixture.  While … Read more

Fungal Rich Compost Supports Vigorous Plant Growth

Fungal superhighways operate underground to decompose minerals and nutrients from soil and deliver them to plants.  For this reason, fungi are powerful, yet too often overlooked additions to plant production.  Many industrial agricultural techniques damage these fungal communities, resulting in less than optimal crop yields, reduced crop nutrition, and increased need for agrochemicals.  As a result, … Read more

What Exactly is a Biological Soil Crust?

Soil Crusts are Tiny Communities that Can Help You Build Healthy Soil Did you ever walk out in the desert following a rainstorm?  If so, you may have noticed a thin black or green layer  on the surface of the soil.   Of course. you may have noticed a sprinkling of dry, black powder on the soil surface … Read more

Remembering the Past With Yerba de Alonso Garcia

 Did Native Americans Name Good Plants after Good People? My friend Andrea once told me that early Americans, like the Navajo and the Apache, named plants with beneficial properties after people they liked. It was sort of a way to compliment the good people in their lives.  She added that snakes, flies, and mosquitoes might be … Read more

On Solar Powered Nitrogen Factories

  Recently, I was invited into a discussion on the potential for “solar powered nitrogen factories”. The dialog dealt with using legumes and grasses as cover crops to increase soil fertility. This is of course, a great strategy which farmers are adopting at large scales. As the cover crops grow, they release sugars that feed … Read more

Chemical Dependency Starts in the Soil

Chemical dependence begins in the soil where our food is grown. Chemical Dependency Is About So Much More Than Recreational Drugs Growing up on the edge of Generation X, I learned early on about the most universally recognized forms of chemical dependency.  In our community, we were exposed to a number of people who drank too … Read more