Impact of The Rhizophagy Cycle on Nitrogen Efficiency in Broadacre Crops

Hi, friends, and welcome to our webinar.

On how to produce profitable, high yielding broadacre crops. There have been a number of questions that have come up in the last few months. People have wanted to better understand the.

Nitrogen management, better understand biological management, and how they can easily get the benefits.

That we have been talking about on commercial scale broadacre commodity crops. So for our conversation today, I will.

Be speaking specifically about how to harness biology to deliver nutrition to crops.

So there have been conversations for the.

Last, probably 10 to 20 years, particularly.

In the last three to four years, about the tremendous capacity of biology to.

Deliver all the nutrients that a crop needs for its nutrition requirements.

And this is a really significant claim.

And the idea that we don't need.

To add any more fertilizers, we don't.

Need to add nitrogen, we don't need to add phosphorus, we don't need to.

Add potassium and trace minerals, and that.

The only thing we need to add is biological is an idea that on the surface seems rather far out in left field. And the idea that biology can deliver.

Everything that the crop needs immediately starts.

Raising a lot of questions. Where do all the nutrients come from?

Are we going to deplete the nutrients.

In the soil profile? These, I think, are all good questions.

But we have a very different situation.

Today from what was present five years or 10 years ago.

And the situation today is that we.

Do in fact, have a number of growers we have observed that have been successful in achieving this level of soil biology performance, where we have growers who are producing the same or higher yields.

As the surrounding region, but without constant fertilizer inputs. And I talk about fertilizer inputs.

There's even a few occasions of dry land farming where growers are not even applying.

They're not applying any manure, they're applying.

No compost, they're applying no liquid fish or other sources of nitrogen in organic.

Forms, nutrients in organic forms. And because of farming in dry land, they're also not growing cover crops, which.

I am not an advocate of at all. But that is the situation. We've observed that to be successful on a few operations.

So what I wanted to speak about is how can we develop a biology to the point where we can deliver.

A much greater degree of overall plant nutrition with the goal of reducing fertilizer applications and maintaining or increasing yields. So the discussion is really in three different pieces. The first piece is how does biology supply nutrition to this degree? What is the science behind it? And the second part is how can we take the science and put it into practical application on our farms.

And the third part is, what are some of the things that we are.

Doing that are preventing this from working in the first place? If it's true that biology has the capacity to do this, and why is it not happening now and why hasn't it been happening in the past? There are in fact, many reports of biology delivering nutrition to this degree in.

The past, but then not continuing because of mismanagement.

So I want to speak about each of those three pieces.

We're going to begin.

I have a few slides and a few illustrations that I want to show when I want to speak about the.

Principles in the science.

So the first piece that I want to speak about is the concept, the idea that plants can absorb their nutrition.

From biology and that biology can deliver 100% of the nutrients that a crop requires.

So today there are two models of.

Plant nutrition, two different paradigms that are.

Competing for people's attention and for implementation out in the field.

The traditional model, and I say traditional.

Loosely because it's only been traditional for the last since justice von Liebig. So the last 100 some years, is.

The idea that plants can absorb simple.

Ions from the soil solution.

So ammonium ions and nitrate ions, calcium.

Magnesium, potassium, sodium, and all these various.

Ions, mineral, trace mineral ions that are present in the soil profile.

The second model is, instead of a.

Plant absorbing microbial metabolites, the idea that they can absorb the majority of their.

Nutrition in the form of amino acids.

Organic acids, essential fatty acids, and in.

Fact, even entire microbial cells.

And this has been an area that.

I've been really fascinated by and personally have found very interesting.

For the last decade or more, I've.

Been studying and I have found that there is, in fact, a large body of research that speaks about the plant.

Capacity, plant's capacity to absorb large molecules.

But it has not been very well known in the mainstream.

There was some research done In Germany probably 30, 35 years ago, where they talk about, where they described the capacity.

Of plants to absorb molecules up to a molecular weight of about 1000, which is a really large molecule for comparison. If you're not familiar with thinking about molecular sizes, then antibiotics such as penicillin, for example, would be considered to have a molecular size of about 500. So we're speaking about fairly complex molecules.

That plants have been described to be able to absorb.

But the piece that was missing is.

We didn't really have a good understanding.

Or good explanations of how this was happening.

We knew it was happening, but weren't.

Able to fully understand how it was happening.

And so there have been back in.

The 80s and then there was an update in 1993 from Argilia and Gilbert.

Retaver and the Organic Method Primer, a.

Valuable book that I highly recommend. It's on my recommended reading list that I published on the blog.

I think it's not well enough known.

Not widely enough known.

They were actually speaking about endocytosis, the.

Capacity of plant cells, including root tip cells and leaf cells, to absorb large.

Molecules directly across the cell membrane. So endocytosis has been known to be.

Whereby animal cells and human cells absorb nutrients for 70 some years, but it.

Hasn'T been widely studied and adopted and.

Utilized in the agricultural space. So late last year someone pointed me to the research of Dr. James White.

At Rutgers University on the process of rhizophagy. I hosted Dr. White on the podcast.

Where we spoke about some of his research. I highly recommend his papers and the.

Research that he has done on plants absorbing entire microbes directly from the soil profile. There isn't really time to do the broad scope of his research justice in just a few minutes conversation, but I.

Want to at least introduce the concept.

If you haven't heard of it before. And I highly encourage you and highly recommend that you listen to that podcast.

Interview and perhaps read the blog post that I posted on the blog about this.

I'm incredibly excited by Dr. James work.

Because he describes a mechanism and a pathway for plant absorption of entire microbial cells.

It's very well documented, very well described, peer reviewed literature and when we fully.

Understand the implications of what he is describing, it will completely displace the current.

Way of thinking about agronomy and plant nutrition.

Instead of needing to have a soil analysis to measure the calcium and magnesium and the mineral ion profile. What we really need when we understand that plants are absorbing organic molecules and living organisms, we need an assay that.

Identifies quantity of living organisms and the.

Quantity of microbial metabolites for plants to absorb.

That is something that I believe will.

Be happening in the near future is.

Understanding that plant nutrition is not just about the mineral profile or the ionic profile. It is really about the profile of microbial metabolites that is available for plants to absorb an actual living microbes themselves. So Dr. James White's work is he.

Describes the rhizophagy cycle and he has some really great diagrams and photos of which I'll share a few, but he has many more in his peer reviewed published papers. I highly encourage you to look those up and read Them.

We've referenced them both here on the slides, but then also in the podcast.

That I wrote before.

The simple idea is that healthy seeds should be coated with beneficial organisms, particularly.

Groups of bacteria and fungi that are termed endophytes, meaning they can live inside the plant, and they colonize the interior of the plant, the plant's vascular tissue.

They live inside the plant, and they.

Also can live in the soil profile. So in his research as a plant.

Pathologist, James White observed that plants actually.

Had the capacity to absorb entire microbial cells, both bacterial and fungal cells, but in particular, bacterial cells, through the growing root tip.

And when they entered into the root.

Tip, they move backwards from the growing tip of the root.

And the plant would produce and submit these microbial cells, these bacterial cells, to.

High concentrations of superoxide and oxidize the cell membranes and strip the cell membranes. Then these naked cell membranes, these naked cells would actually be absorbed into the.

Plant cells, and the plant cells would begin stripping away nucleic acids and amino.

Acids and so forth, and use the microbial cells as a source of nutrition.

And then further back in the root system, these microbes would stimulate the development.

Of root hairs and the elongation of root hairs. And they would exit out the tip.

Of these root hairs where the walls were very thin.

And the plant roots would actually transmit.

Very specific forms of sugars and amino.

Acids to these naked cells. Some of these microbial cells would survive, just a small percentage of them.

Many of them would be actually used by the plant as a source of nutrition. But some of them would survive this process and be transmitted back out into the soil environment. And the plant would actually support them.

By giving them very specific carbohydrates and amino acids to allow them to reform their cell membranes. And then these microbial cells, these bacteria, which are now out in the soil profile, release nutrients and extract nutrients from the soil mineral matrix that the plant needs. And they also signal to the rest.

Of the microbial profile.

This is not in Dr. White's research, but in other research, where they signal.

That there are variety of different signaling.

Mechanisms that plants use to transmit information to the microbial population, likely along this.

Pathway, but also by other means to communicate exactly what nutrients they require.

So the plant can tell the biology.

That, I need more phosphorus, I need.

Less potassium, I need more zinc.

And then biology goes into the soil profile, into the mineral matrix, and extracts.

Those minerals and makes them available to plants.

I get really excited by this. You know what this means? It means that plants farming microbes, they're.

Farming Biology and bacteria the same way that we farm livestock. So it is in our best interest.

As farm managers if we want to produce high yielding crops to enhance this process, to speed up this process and have this process deliver the majority of a plant's attrition.

In other webinars, and for those of you who are familiar with our work.

Historically, we speak about a plant health pyramid, getting to level three in the.

Plant health pyramid, where plants produce an abundance of lipids, they have a surplus of energy, more energy than they need.

For their own needs and to successfully reproduce. We also speak about it again in.

The biological cascade, when plants are absorbing an abundance of microbial metabolites and they begin forming higher levels of lipids.

Those lipids go out to the roots as root exudates. Getting to level three on the plant.

Health pyramid and achieving this level of.

Plant health, where we can rapidly build.

Organic matter while we are growing a crop, is dependent on this rhizophagy cycle.

It is dependent on plants absorbing a.

Majority of their nutrition in the form of microbial metabolites and living microbes, rather than in the form of simple ions.

This is an important point. When plants absorb simple ions from the soil solution, nitrate, potassium, calcium ions, and.

So forth, that is essential.

Plants do have the capacity to do that.

That is how hydroponics works.

And if we use that model in an agricultural context, we are relying simply.

On a glorified hydroponics model.

It makes no sense to use this model of agronomy and plant nutrition in a living system.

It makes no sense. Of course, when you use this model.

Of plants absorbing simple ions, the key phrase is that they absorb simple ions.

From the soil solution.

So what happens when there is no soil solution?

What happens when you have drought, when you have dry soils and water is reduced, when you're dependent on this glorified hydroponics model and water disappears?

That means the plants also have no.

Capacity to absorb nutrition.

And this is a very key point, because biology, particularly various fungi, such as mycorrhizal fungi and others, but also these bacteria can live on very thin biofilms.

And microfilms on soil particle surfaces, and they can access water when plant roots.

Cannot access water and a different way.

And the implications of that, which have.

Already been observed in many farms, in.

Many fields, is that biology can deliver nutrition and continue to deliver nutrition to.

Plants in drought situations, because biology can.

Deliver water and nutrients in the absence of abundant water, even in drought stress situations.

This becomes a very important point in.

The climactic challenged world that Many of us that we are all living in today and needing to produce crops in. So Dr. White has a lot of really great photomicrographs of the research that they have done. Just going to share a few of them.

This is a micrograph of bacteria being.

At the tips of roots and being ready to be absorbed by roots.

Here we have one another one of the growing root tip being surrounded by.

Bacterial cells and microbial cells.

Here we have a photomicrograph of bacteria.

Actually inside growing root tips. Pretty incredible when you look at the large volume of cells that are contained.

Within this growing root tip, both plant cells, and then also of course, within.

Each of these plant cells we have these smaller bacterial cells that have been absorbed through endocytosis.

This is really an incredible process and the reality is that we can use.

This process to supply a plant's nutritional requirements.

Dr. James White was willing to surmise.

That for non domesticated crop, a majority, perhaps even as much as 100% of the nutrition of non domesticated crops, the crops that we, the plants that we call weeds and trees and so forth, are getting the majority or 100% of their nutrition in this form.

However, in practical real world infield experience.

We have experience with crops where the measured levels of soluble ions in the.

Soil profile was very, very low, bordering.

On being non existent and non detectable.

And yet crop nutrition was very good, producing average to exceptional yields for the area.

So there's more research and validation that needs to be done. But based on practical field experience, I do believe that we can supply 100% of a crop's nutritional requirements using this rhizo Fiji process. Now, I'm sure many of you have heard stories of Gabe Brown and Dave.

Brandt and a list of farmers who.

Have been successful in developing using cover crops, using crop rotations and developing soils.

Where they can deliver 100% of a plant's nutrition requirements without added fertilizers. In order for that to happen, this.

Process needs to be working effectively. So the next question becomes, okay, how do we take this science, these ideas.

And translate them into practical real world.

Application in the field?

And the pathway to delivering this is.

First, we need to establish microbial populations.

That can deliver these benefits, and second, we need to stop damaging what is already present.

Before I talk about those two pieces, I would like to comment on nitrogen.

Specifically, just a little bit.

The air that we sit in and walk around in and breathe is 78% nitrogen. And the idea that we need to buy more is kind of a crazy idea.

The only reason we would ever need.

To buy more is if we have.

Destroyed our soil biology's capacity to deliver.

The nitrogen that we need.

I have had conversations with growers who.

Have the lab analysis and the lab data to support this, who've said that their soils are fixing and they are testing and analyzing that their soils are.

Fixing 300 units of nitrogen per year. This is on a commercial scale, on tens of thousands of acres. And so that is really what is possible. That's the potential that we have of.

Delivering nutrients and fixing, in the case of nitrogen, fixing nitrogen from the air and delivering it to the crop.

All right, so how do we do this? Part one, delivering or establishing the microbial.

Populations that can accomplish this in practical application. We know and understand that we should have healthy, high quality seed that has a strong population of these beneficial endophytes on the seed coat.

The populations of endophytes, the quality and quantity of endophytes contained on the seed coating can be affected by genetics and.

By the plant breeding process.

I covered this in the podcast interview with James White.

You can listen to that if you want more details on how and how this works.

But very simply, every, every seed, the optimum is for every seed to be.

Coated with abundant biology and the right.

Biology of these symbiotic endophytes. And not just endophytes, but also mycorrhizal.

Fungi and other bacteria that have a.

Beneficial symbiotic relationship with the plant.

So our approach in consulting work that we've done at advancing eco agriculture is.

To make certain that every seed that gets planted of almost any crop, that every crop that we work with, we.

Use a seed treatment of Biokoat Gold.

For those of you who are not familiar with Biokoat Gold, it is a combination inoculant that includes various different mycorrhizal.

Fungi, a number of different strains of bacteria, beneficial bacteria. So it's a combination of both a.

Bacterial inoculant, a fungal inoculant, and then.

It also contains different ingredients that can benefit the seed and benefit soil biology in different ways. And you can find the information on BioCCO by looking at the label and the SDS sheets that are available.

Biokote Gold is inexpensive.

It costs at most a few dollars.

Per acre to apply on broad acre commodity crops, fruit and vegetable crops, we.

Apply a little bit more. And in all of our work, when we look at the economic returns of.

Where can we apply the least input.

And produce the greatest economic response for the grower?

Biological seed treatments of well designed biologicals always win hands down there at the.

Top of the list.

Biokoat Gold is a very inexpensive, effective and necessary seed treatment that I believe everyone needs to be using.

And that includes crops which are not.

Considered to be mycorrhizal associated, such as.

Brassicas, kale, broccoli, cauliflower.

I guess in this conversation we're focusing.

Specifically on commodity crops, but what we've observed is that even plants which are supposedly don't have an association with mycorrhizae.

For whatever reason, even though they don't associate with mycorrhizae.

We get a plant growth response and a quality response when we inoculate them with mycorrhizae.

And I don't have a hypothesis for.

Why this works or how it works.

But I know that it does work because we've observed it on quite a.

Large scale on a number of different farms.

So that's practical application.

Step one, you want to use seed treatments to inoculate those seeds, to give them any additional biology that may be missing from the seed as a result of poor seed production quality or poor.

Genetics and historical breeding.

Because this, this transfer of biology from.

Parent population to seed can be interrupted by some breeding techniques, particularly by cell culture propagation, which Dr. White described in.

The discussion that we had with him.

The second practical application tool that I believe is very important is the applications of soil inoculants.

So when seed is planted that doesn't have all of the needed associated endophytes.

Then it has to recruit those endophytes.

Those needed microbes from the soil microbial population after the seed germinates.

And this is a process that may, depending on the soil biology and soil.

Health, may take from a few days to a week or more. And in that time period, as the.

Seed is recruiting the beneficial organisms that.

It needs to surround its root system and be present in its rhizosphere, it leaves it particularly susceptible to fungal attack.

And bacterial attack in the root system.

And it can set the stage for infections later on in the season if.

The associated, the endophytes and the associated.

Beneficial biology aren't present and immediately able to populate that root system.

So as a result, many of you.

Are familiar with our fall primer. We originally just, we developed it, we call it, still call it our fall soil primer.

But the soil primer is an application.

Of rejuvenate, seashield and spectrum. The intent is to establish a very strong, vigorous bacterial population in the soil profile that is present all the time.

We originally started putting this application on.

Mostly in the fall, and we still observe the biggest benefits in the fall.

Increasingly, we have growers that because of ease of use and for logistical reasons, focus on spring applications. At planting instead of in the fall.

We get a smaller response. It's not as big of a response, but we still get a very nice crop response from those spring applications.

So those are the two applications that.

We focus on to first build this.

Strong bacterial population that can deliver nutrients.

To the plant during the rhizophagy cycle. Now let's go to the third piece.

The third piece is what are the.

Things that we are doing, management practices, nutrition management practices that are preventing this process from working right now.

If it is possible for rhizophagy to.

Deliver 100% of plant nutrition, as is.

Being experienced and observed on Gabe Brown's.

Farm and Dave Brand's farm and others.

Then why isn't it happening on all farms? The reason it's not happening on most.

Soils is because we have killed suppress.

The biology that can deliver those results.

And there are obvious ways in which.

We kill them and suppress them. Biology.

Having the soil bare and exposed to sunlight and exposed to rain. If you have bare soil and the temperature goes up to 120, 130 degrees.

On the soil surface down to a.

Depth of 2 inches, you're killing all the soil biology in those top several inches of the soil layer.

So having bare soil and tilling our.

Soils are excellent ways to make certain that this process does not happen for us and won't happen anytime in the immediate future unless we change our management practices.

Another very effective way of shutting down the expression of this process is adding the nutrients that plants need in highly soluble forms. So it is well established and well.

Known that mycorrhizal fungi have the capacity to extract locked up phosphorus in the soil profile and make it available to plants and supply all of the plants needed phosphorus requirements.

It is also well known that this.

Process gets shut down completely 100% the moment you add phosphorus fertilizer. So if you add a liquid phosphorus such as 10, 34O or 9, 18:9 or dry phosphorus MAP or DAP planting or before planting, the plant gets the signal that it has a surplus abundant.

Levels of soluble and available phosphorus and.

It doesn't send out any. So it sends out the signal in the rhizophagia process that A I don't need phosphorus because I already have plenty.

And B it also doesn't send out.

Any sugars to feed mycorrhizae and the result is that there is not any effective mycorrhizal colonization. So this surplus of available phosphorus is.

Present, depending on the type and quantity.

Applied in the soil profile. It's present perhaps for a few days, a few weeks, to, at the very most, four to six weeks.

And after about four to six weeks, 100% of the applied phosphorus has now been complex in the soil profile, or.

At least 100% that was not hasn't yet been absorbed by the crop at that point, which is the majority, will be complex in the soil profile and.

Bonded with calcium and magnesium and iron and aluminum and formed into tricalcium, phosphate, etc.

So your phosphorus application is complex and is no longer plantable in plant, absorbable by the plant root system.

And you have no mycorrhizal colonization, you've.

Shut down all the mycorrhizae. So for the rest of the growing season, plant is going to suffer from not having a good phosphorus supply.

So an excellent way to shut down phosphorus absorption for an entire growing season is to apply soluble phosphorus fertilizer at.

The beginning at planting.

And that same pattern holds true for nitrogen applications. If you want to develop a soil.

That has the capacity to fix 300 units of nitrogen per year from the atmosphere, then your pathway to that result.

Is to start reducing and eventually eliminating nitrogen applications.

So let's talk about nitrogen for a little bit, because I think this is.

The one area that it is easy to improve profitability on commodity crops very.

Quickly and very effectively.

Many of us have heard examples of.

Farms who produce a crop with only a fraction of the nitrogen applications that would be expected to be needed.

We understand that a pound of nitrogen.

Is not a pound of nitrogen. They're not all the same.

Some growers require as much as 1.2.

1.3 units of nitrogen to grow a bushel of corn.

And there are other growers who produce.

A bushel of corn using 0.3 units of nitrogen. And so what are the differences is I'm using extreme examples on both ends of the spectrum.

Even if you don't use extreme examples.

If you just use one pound of nitrogen per bushel of corn versus a half a pound of nitrogen per bushel of corn, which are fairly common examples, there's still a 2x difference.

One is only half of the other.

So why the significant difference?

The reason for the difference is because plants don't metabolize nitrogen all the same.

They use different forms of nitrogen, produce different crop responses, and absorbing amino acids versus absorbing nitrate.

Those are the two complete opposite ends of the spectrum. When a plant absorbs amino acids, it contributes energy to the plant.

When, and this is where you can get a bushel of corn with a half a pound of nitrogen, is when the plant is absorbing amino acids versus when it's absorbing nitrate.

It requires a lot of energy for.

The plant to convert nitrate to amino acids within the plant and it also requires a lot of water.

Increases drought susceptibility when plants absorb lots of nitrate.

So you want plants to absorb amino acids and peptides and proteins using this rhizophagy process. So now the question becomes, alright, last.

Year I applied 200 units of nitrogen.

Or 300 units of nitrogen. How do I begin going down this pathway in this process?

There's too many different details and different.

Possibilities for me to speak about all of them.

But the one point that I do.

Want to make is, I believe our success at advancing eco agriculture in going down this pathway has been as a result of constantly testing and monitoring.

We don't guess whether we've applied enough nitrogen or not. We measure and we identify exactly whether.

The plants and the crop has enough or not.

And in many cases.

Growers are amazed when their crop is reporting that it has abundant nitrogen levels and they've only applied a third of what they have applied in the past. So we have a lot of experience.

Significantly reducing nitrogen application rates with some.

Of the tools that I'm about to speak about.

But we don't do that by shooting blind. We don't do that by just making a guess. We measure the nitrogen that the soil.

Is capable of delivering using a Haney analysis.

And then we actually measure the plant.

Absorbed nitrogen during the growing season using plant SAP analysis.

So we don't guess. We try to make recommendations based exactly.

On what's happening and what's going on. As we've taken this approach in this process, we've developed a set of tools for increasing nitrogen efficiency. So historically you may have been applying.

Liquid 32 or liquid 28 nitrogen.

Even better, you may be applying liquid urea.

And these concepts that I'm speaking about, I'm going to be focusing on liquid nitrogen applications. The same concepts and ideas also hold.

True for dry out dry applications. But I'm going to be focusing on liquids because that is what we find many people to be using. So.

First, I can say very simply.

That in all of our experiences I've.

Had this conversation with many different growers.

We have a lot of SAP analysis data. Urea is by far the most efficient form of nitrogen to apply.

When you apply AMMONIUM and nitrate with a smaller amount of urea, such as.

In the form of liquid 32 or liquid 28.

According to research at Iowa State and.

In Kansas at KSU, as little as.

40% of the applied nitrogen is actually.

Absorbed by the crop.

This is why growers are applying 300.

Units, because the majority is not actually being absorbed and the rest of it.

Significant portion of it, goes down the river. Some of it is held in the soil microbial profile. That means if you were to increase.

The efficiency where the plant absorbed 100% of what was applied right off the top, you could cut the application rates by 60%. And this is something that urea is particularly good at. Many of our most successful growers who.

Reduced their nitrogen application rates the most have converted to liquid urea 20, 100.

Instead of liquid 28 or liquid 32.

A pound of nitrogen is not a pound of nitrogen. You can't price liquid urea compared to.

Liquid 32 and 28 based on units.

Of N. A liquid urea will definitely be more expensive per pound of nitrogen and it will be significantly less expensive.

Per acre because you don't have to apply 60% more in order to get the same amount of crop absorption. So that would be my first recommendation, is to use liquid urea instead of liquid 32 or 28. And doing that by itself will allow you to significantly reduce application rates. Then, when you are applying liquid nitrogen in any form 28, 32 or liquid urea, the goal is to convert this.

Liquid nitrogen into amino acid nitrogen as quickly as possible.

I'm using the words amino acid nitrogen, but I should really be talking about.

Organic nitrogen because it is amino acids.

It'S peptides, it's proteins.

Really what we want to happen is we want all of the applied nitrogen.

To be absorbed by soil biology and bacteria and converted into bacterial cells as quickly as possible.

So how do you do that? You achieve that by buffering out the.

Liquid nitrogen application with some carbon, by supplying some soluble carbon and sugars as.

A food source for the bacteria to consume, and by making certain they have.

The nutrients they need to convert this nitrogen, these various forms of nitrogen, into amino acids. So I'll give you the recipe that we use. First. We start with a liquid nitrogen solution.

And we add enough ammonium thiosulfate, which.

You may be familiar with as thiosol or ATS. The nutrient content is a 12,0026, 26% sulfur.

We include ammonium thiosulfate in the liquid.

Solution, high enough to give us a.

10 to 1 nitrogen to sulfur ratio. So you can do the math depending.

On what form of liquid nitrogen you're using.

Add enough sulfur, you get a 10.

To 1 nitrogen to sulfur ratio. That's the first part. So now you have this total liquid solution.

And to that you add 3% humicarb.

And that can be either on a weight, weight or volume, volume basis. So you take your total solution, your.

Combination of liquid nitrogen and ammonium thiosulfate.

3% of that total solution should be added in the form of humicarb. Humicarb as humic substances. There's reams of research on the capacity of humic substances to stabilize and hold nitrogen and prevent it from leaching through the profile.

Then we also add 3% rejuvenate.

And the rejuvenate is very important because we need a soluble carbohydrate source. So we're adding a lot of nitrogen. We need a soluble carbon source.

Humicarb is carbon, but it is not digestible carbon.

It's not carbon that bacteria can consume.

To develop their own cells.

So we add rejuvenate to supply that soluble carbon and to supply some of the enzymes, the minerals, nutrients that plant that the microbes need as enzyme cofactors to help them with the nitrogen conversion process. And lastly, the last ingredient in the mix is, is molybdenum, because molybdenum is needed for the nitrate reductase enzyme.

And we add molybdenum. Typically, rates will vary depending on what's going on in your soil profile and.

SAP analysis, any history that we have.

But typical application rates would be in.

The neighborhood of a pint to a quart per acre of rebound molybdenum. So we use that stack, that combination of those four additions, ammonium thiosulfate, humicarb.

Rejuvenate and molybdenum rebound molybdenum.

And that combination will significantly increase your nitrogen use efficiency.

We routinely cut application rates by 30.

To 40% just going into the gate, even without data. And then once we have data, we'll often cut application rates when we change.

From liquid 32 to liquid urea, plus adding this combination, this fact that I.

Just spoke about, There are a number of farmers across the Midwest who can testify to the fact that they've reduced.

Their nitrogen application rates in terms of.

Units of nitrogen, pounds of nitrogen by.

60 to 70% and get the exact same crop response and crop yields. But they also get resistance to insects.

And they get resistance to diseases.

They no longer have as severe spider.

Mite pressure they no longer have severe.

Aphid pressure and the entire corn earworm pressure.

The entire insect susceptibility profile changes because these plants no longer have a surplus of ammonium and nitrate showing up in the plant SAP and in the plant leaf itself. So that's kind of the overview of.

The practical applications and also the science.

There comes a point. It is possible to gradually reduce nitrogen applications if you're putting on 300 units.

To very quickly, very rapidly in the.

First year, reduce those applications to 150 to 200 units. It's very common for us to do that. And then over a period of a few years, as we develop the rhizophagy.

Process, we develop the soil microbial population, we start with COVID crops perhaps, and other management practices. It's not difficult to within a few.

Years move from, let's say, 150 units of nitrogen down to 50 units per crop. And at that point, with the Haney.

Soil analysis, once you have a highly functioning biology, you can now collect the data and be comfortable making the decision.

To say, you know what, my soil has the capacity to deliver 200 units of nitrogen. My crop only needs 150, so I'm going to shut off the valve.

We don't need to constantly apply nitrogen anymore. And this is very realistic, very achievable goal.

It's not that difficult. There's many people who have done it.

And many more people will be achieving.

These goals in the next few years. So I'm going to switch to Q.

And A and answer any questions that.

You have typed in. I really enjoy questions, so thank you for submitting those.

First question from Mark Menderwerf.

Hi Mark.

Do you think the mineral nutrition with.

Anions and cations, as we know in hydroponics, is negative for the rise of agie cycle?

In other words, the higher the electrical.

Conductivity in the soil, the slower the rise of aging cycle, perhaps. So the way that you frame this.

Question makes it interesting and a bit.

Difficult to answer directly. So to the point that I made earlier, fertilizer applications and nutrient applications directly.

Do suppress the rhizophagy cycle and they.

Do suppress the soil microbial population. No question. That's part one.

So that's kind of the easy answer. But then specifically, when you start thinking.

About electrical conductivity, we need to develop some nuance in the way that we.

Think about electrical conductivity, because there are.

Two different types of material which can contribute electrical conductivity to the soil profile.

Soluble salts such as urea or nitrogen or phosphorus applications. And we have salt fertilizers, chemical fertilizers.

With soluble anions and cations.

Those obviously, as we know, directly increase.

The EC significantly, that is an ionic ec, as I would refer to it.

But then these microbial metabolites also increase.

Ec, not as rapidly as salt fertilizers do, but they're also much more stable. They don't fluctuate as much up and down. So it is very possible to have a high electrical conductivity soil with no.

Ionic fertilizers or no ionic nutrients present. And that is incredibly exciting and a.

Lot of fun to work with a.

Soil like that when that happens. So electrical conductivity can be from microbial metabolites, or it can be from simple.

Ions or some combination of both.

The goal should be to develop soils.

That have high levels of electrical conductivity coming from biology, not coming from the.

Applied nutrients and simple ions question. About 300 units of nitrogen was mentioned.

Can you explain this further? So, 300? Yeah. This is a per acre number. This is from Adam Hicks. Hi, Adam. We've worked with a number of growers who, when we first started working with.

Them, their standard application for the season.

Was 300 pounds of nitrogen per acre. So that's a pound of nitrogen per acre is sometimes referred to as a unit. And that's a ridiculously high application rate, in my opinion, and one that is.

Surprisingly widespread throughout the Midwest, all the.

Way from Kansas to Pennsylvania, we've encountered growers who are putting on 300 units of nitrogen. And that's crazy, but I guess you know my opinion and perspective on that.

It really is crazy. Question from Matt.

Can you describe the seed coating process for large amounts of seed, say, 100 bushels of oats?

Obviously, if you want to, you need.

To have some way of mixing and blending or applying the coating during seed transfer. So this is not something that I'm intimately familiar with, and I'm not the best person to ask this question. The one tip that I have learned.

Recently from several growers, when they're doing.

Large seeds such as oats and wheat.

Small grains, beans, and corn in particular.

Where the seed coatings as a dust.

Don'T want to adhere to the seed.

Very well, they take the first step of spraying the seed with a very light coat of sugar water, and that.

Makes the seed sticky, and then the.

Seed treatments stick and adhere to the seeds very well. So I know that growers have developed the ability to actually spray this on.

And then in some manner also apply the dry powder from seed transfer from.

One bulk transfer to another.

At the beginning or at the end.

Of a conveyor chute.

I don't know exactly what setup they're.

Using to do that and how that is working.

So I'm not the best person to.

Answer that question, but that's. I know one of the ways that they're doing it.

Question from Leanna Horster.

Hi, Liana.

Does application of manure based compost that.

Is high in phosphorus cause the same.

Problem as applications of liquid phosphorus fertilizer? It can depends on the application rate and the quantity of phosphorus that is present.

But yes, it is possible to suppress.

Microbial development in soils, particularly from liquid manure applications. When we apply manure that has high.

Concentrations of phosphorus and nitrogen. And I believe.

Many farmers think of.

Liquid manure as a fertilizer.

But liquid manure actually has a lot of negative downsides.

It has specific.

Exceptional properties of the biocide.

It can kill biology because of being in anaerobic situation in the lagoon.

And it's actually very simple.

If you see liquid manure killing earthworms, then it's not killing just earthworms, it's killing a lot of other things as well. So there's a very good conversation that we that could be had about improving the quality of liquid manure.

It's possible to treat liquid manure using, rejuvenate, using humicarb, using some microbial inoculants.

Such as OP8, that we can turn a liquid manure lagoon into something that smells good and that is almost a complete liquid and has a positive fertilizer benefit the soil, rather than having a negative effect to biology, has a positive effect on biology. So I believe that a lot of liquid manure legumes should be treated to change the soil effects from a net negative to a net positive.

Question from Steve Tucker. If I have used phosphorus fertilizer last.

Spring, will mycorrhizal fungi work this year? If I do not apply phosphorus fertilizer, the answer is yes.

Typically soluble phosphorus fertilizers are complex in the soil profile in again varies depending on concentrations, application rates, form of phosphorus, soil mineral profiles, and so forth. But typically within three to four weeks on the outside, 100% of what is applied gets complexed and then the biology.

Has to release it again for the rest of the season. One point that I didn't address that it didn't make is a question that sometimes gets asked is I've been speaking about nitrogen, the capacity to fix nitrogen. But how does biology deliver phosphorus and.

Potassium from the soil profile?

We know that we need significant quantities.

The reality is, when you look at the data on the geological profiles and.

The nutrients contained within geological profiles, most.

Agricultural soils there are a few exceptions.

If you have very sandy soils or perhaps muck soils and so forth.

But most agricultural soils have anywhere between 6 and 9,000 pounds of phosphorus per.

Acre in the top 4 to 6.

Inches, and they have between 35 and 45,000 pounds of potassium in the top 6 inches.

So we're talking about centuries of supply.

In the top six inches alone.

That's not even considering the B horizon.

And considering that as we develop biology.

That topsoil level is going to grow. So when you do the math, we are not at risk of exhausting the soil's nutrient levels that are held within the mineral matrix within the reserve anytime soon. We have a largely inexhaustible supply in many different soil profiles Comment from Dave.

Mattinson Just regarding brassicas and mycorrhizae, Dr. Christine Jones says that they do tap into the common mycorrhizal network and extract nutrients from the fungi transporting the nutrients. It just says that brassic exchange sugars.

Into the network so that they aren't symbiotic.

Thank you for that comment, Dave.

I know that we certainly have observed that in the field.

We've observed strong responses from mycorrhizal inoculation.

On crops that supposedly are not symbiotic. Thanks for sharing that.

Question from Ryan Newton in regards to.

Total nitrogen, if my SAP analysis report levels in the new and old leaves.

That are above optimum, yet the old.

Leaves are over 10% lower than new.

Leaves in total nitrogen, does the crop.

Still require more nitrogen?

It's a great question, Ryan, and the answer is generally no.

So if both old and new are above optimum, then.

You can pay less.

Attention to the ratios between the two.

And there's different explanations for why the.

New leaves might be really high, perhaps as a result of specific weather conditions or something that caused a lot of water to move up into the new leaves. So there's different things that could be going on, but the short answer is.

You don't still require more nitrogen if both old and new leaves are above optimal levels. Another question what are the effects of.

Nitrogen on the root system and how do these effects differ in intercrop and soil crops? So this is this is a big.

Question, too big to take the time.

To answer in detail, but the short version is that nitrates and ammonium and urea and amino acids.

Each of these forms of nitrogen affects.

The ratio of root biomass to top to vegetative biomass in different ways.

When plants absorb ammonium or urea they have a much larger root biomass or amino acids. They have a much larger root biomass.

And a smaller vegetative biomass in proportion to each other.

With nitrate the opposite is true.

You have more vegetative biomass and less root biomass. So it is important to think about that in forms of nitrogen that we use as well.

Question from Laron I have not applied any potassium fertilizer or any dry fertilizer.

The last three years, but I have seen severe deficiency in areas of my cornfield. What can I do to proactively address this?

Have also already applied the fall soil primer. Any other thoughts?

This is in corn. I have intentions to use humicarb with my nitrogen as well as sulfur, but in recent years I have not yet reduced applied nitrogen.

Laren this is a great question and.

There is an answer, but I'd rather not guess at what that answer is.

So if you are seeing declines and nutrient deficiencies in different areas of your cornfield because of not having adequate phosphorus.

Or potassium or whatever the case might be, then that's a very simple signal that your soil biology is not yet.

Delivering what the crop needs. So we need to find out why.

That is and address that.

You've been doing the right thing with the fall soil primer applications, but I.

Would suggest also conducting some Haney soil analysis and I would have questions about what you're doing regarding cover crops, any manure applications and so forth. So it is possible to reverse that within a year or two, perhaps even less, but I wouldn't want to guess at the answer. I would suggest conducting some Haney analysis and connecting with one of our AEA.

Consultants to identify exactly what's happening and what's going on. Question from Matt Would adding liquid urea.

Signal to the plant that excess nitrogen.

Is present, thereby shutting down the plant.

Microbes similar to the phosphorus example that you mentioned? Matt?

The answer is definitely yes. Not just urea, but any soluble nitrogen liquid28,32, even ammonium sulfate, ammonium thiosulfate, all forms of liquid nitrogen have this effect of shutting down the microbial fixation process.

Of fixing nitrogen from the air, at least temporarily and probably more than temporarily actually. So they do shut down that process.

And the tools that I described of.

Reducing nitrogen applications are simply tools to.

Start down this pathway and develop some experience, develop some comfort with it, and.

Then develop our soil biology as we're.

Going down this pathway, where in two.

Or three years from now we reach a point and we have enough data.

To be able to make an informed.

Decision to stop using nitrogen applications on some of our acres and just see what happens and test what happens. Another question. Are biologically active soils that provide plants with the plants with all the crops.

Needed nutrients compatible with the tillage, often.

Used for weed control in organic or row crop situations? It's challenging.

I won't say that it's impossible because every time I've observed someone saying that.

Certain, a certain something is impossible and someone successfully does it somewhere, but it is definitely a lot more challenging to.

Accomplish that type of biological activity with tillage. Not impossible, I wouldn't suggest, but challenging.

Very difficult.

Question from Jerry Snyder. If the soil test shows excessive phosphorus greater than 200 parts per million, would.

It be wise to apply mycorrhizae?

Yes, I believe so. Because in many cases, even when you.

Have high levels of phosphorus showing up on a soil analysis, there's still a large proportion of that phosphorus that is locked up in the mineral matrix.

And mycorrhizal applications can still help to.

Release that and make it available to the crop.

And this is particularly true very often.

We see when we have soils that are really high in phosphorus, the crop.

Itself is low in phosphorus and they're.

Not absorbing it very well because it is so high. It's excessive and it's complex.

So we use a lot of mycorrhizal applications.

In fact, in a lot of our fruit and vegetable crops that have this challenge, we see lots of phosphorus levels in one region. Several regions that I'm thinking of in particular that have phosphorus level as high as 3 to 400 parts per million.

In the high value food and vegetable crops, they will actually apply biokoat gold.

In their irrigation systems once every two to three weeks and just constantly spoon feed it because every time they apply it, they see an increase in phosphorus absorption. And which I find really interesting actually, because you would think that if you apply mycorrhizate once and they, they have.

A colonization effect, they colonize the root.

System, they should be present for the entire season. So it's not fully clear to me where the phosphorus response is coming from, but they're using SAP analysis. It's very clearly measured and very real.

Another question from Murray Hutton. Is thiosulfate or key for organic use? The answer is no, it is not. Question from Anthony Granatelli.

Hi Anthony.

What are the most economic forms of amino acid fertilizers? Purchasing amino acid fertilizers tends to be fairly expensive.

There is, there's corn steep liquor and various bean extracts and pea extracts. Also blood meal.

A number of different companies that make them available, but they're usually fairly pricey.

On a per pound basis.

I really like using them in foliar applications.

I find that they work very well there and they produce a very nice crop response.

On the vegetable crops, we often use.

Them in the fertigation system as well. I don't have a lot of experience on broad acre crops. Question from Jonathan Gingrich Hi Jonathan, in an organic setting, what are your thoughts concerning chicken litter or 1300 feather meal applications? Until we get to the point of.

Getting our hydrogen as described, do they.

Hinder the rise of phagic cycle?

Jonathan, that's an awesome question. Earlier I commented on liquid manure and manure applications. So the advantage of Feather Meal 1300 as well as poultry manure and dry.

Manure is that the majority of the nitrogen in chicken litter and a feather meal is in the form of what is generically referred to as organic nitrogen.

So organic nitrogen is your amino acids.

And peptides and proteins. It'll have a small component of ammonium and a small component of nitrate, but.

The majority will be in the form of organic nitrogen.

And this is valuable.

And I should clarify that this also.

Can be the case for liquid manure as well. It's only when liquid manure sits for a long time and goes through anaerobic.

Fermentation that a lot of the nitrogen can be converted into the form of.

Ammonium where it gases off and we lose nitrogen in the form of ammonium and we have all kinds of other problems. So generally we don't see suppression of soil biology with these forms of nitrogen with manure or feather meal applications unless we apply extremely large amounts.

So if you apply, or if we continue applying them for a long period of time. Actually, I'm thinking of a group of growers in Pennsylvania and in Virginia who.

Have applied poultry manure at application rates of 2 to 3 tons per acre year after year growing organic crops and.

Their soil biology levels have plummeted.

So as I'm just thinking about this.

Maybe my prior answer is incorrect. More experience needed, I suppose. Another question from Jared for those of.

Us who have on farm manure to apply, when is the correct or incorrect time to apply that manure is the N and the P in the manure in a form that will not impact our soil's natural ability to sequester nitrogen phosphorus? All right, this question about manure keeps coming up and I've been continuing to.

Think about the poultry litter application.

In the back of my mind, I suspect that the challenges with the continued.

Poultry manure applications are coming about not.

As a result of the presence of nitrogen and phosphorus, but as a result of the presence of glyphosate and roundup.

That is present in the manure that comes through the feed and goes through.

The gut and through the gizzard and ends up in the manure. So I'm just recalling data and experiences and other places that we've observed that. So to the the answer about manure in general is that the organic nitrogen in manure and the phosphorus that is available in my present understanding, I don't understand that that greatly inhibits the development of this rhizophagy process unless it is.

Applied in excess of quantities.

When it's applied in excess of quantities, then I do believe it is a problem.

Question from Dallas Wessels hi Dallas, when.

Planting corn, I apply 5 gallons per acre of ATS and 5 gallon 32% top of the ground above the row.

I see a 10 bushel per acre yield response. I think I'm getting the response from.

A chemical reaction, the soil from the ATS releasing calcium, other nutrients.

Would you add humicarbon sugar to it.

Or would this buffer this reaction?

Dallas the only way we can know.

For certain, of course, is to test it, but my guess would be that it would not buffer the reaction because you're getting a lot of the reaction.

Coming from the sulfur and the ats.

And I don't think the hemocarbon sugar would buffer that. In fact, it might even speed it up. Of course we'd have to test that on your soil specifically know for sure.

Question from Antonio if the results from.

A soil analysis show that some micronutrients are lacking, can I rely on the rhizophagy cycle for the replacement of that particular mineral?

Antonio this is an awesome question, and.

I answered this question in some detail in a blog post that I wrote.

About different types of soil analysis and.

What they show us. The correct answer is that it depends on what's in your geological profile. So if you have soil that comes from a certain parent rock material that.

Contains that micronutrient, many, many agricultural soils contain 600 up to 900 pounds of.

Manganese in the top 6 inches, for example. So that's a lot of manganese that can be released from a soil profile.

But they may contain no nickel or.

No vanadium or some of these other important elements.

No cobalt, for example. So to answer that question, you really.

Need to Take a geological profile assay.

And measure what is in your soil's total mineral matrix. And then also I would suggest that.

We develop the rhizophagy cycle with the expectation that it will develop cobalt or manganese availability or whatever is missing in two or three years down the road. Let's not let the crop suffer in the short term while this process is developing. So if we have a soil analysis or a crop that is showing us it's not absorbing enough manganese or cobalt or even potassium, then I'm not suggesting that we should stop all applications, but.

That we need to only spoon feed.

What is needed for this crop and do it in such a way that we don't suppress and shut down rhizophagy.

Which is another reason why I love foliar applications rather than soil applications, because.

They don't shut down this process.

Question from Shorty, do foliars shut down plants ability to fix?

Mycorrhizal fungi are fixing and nitrogen. The answer is no. If they're well designed, they should enhance it.

Question from Dave. Just to be clear, you are applying.

No phosphate, just the 2100.

So my comments were specifically on managing.

Nitrogen that didn't include phosphorus. We make recommendations for phosphorus applications based.

On the testing and the data and.

What we see happening.

The phosphorus product that we use is a micronized suspended bonded chelated liquid natural rock phosphate. So it is plant available without being.

Water soluble, which also means that it doesn't get complex in the soil environment.

So we do apply some phosphors at.

Planting, but it is in a form.

That doesn't suppress mycorrhizal colonization. Question from Chad Cohen.

Hi Chad, how many units of nitrogen per application is ideal? How much nitrogen can be quickly converted.

To microbial metabolites in one application or in one setting?

And how long does this conversion take?

And these are great questions. And the answer is if you have adequate soluble carbon digestible sugar in the soil profile and enough water and good.

Soil temperatures, not too hot, not too cold, where you have good biology, they can convert large quantities of liquid nitrogen into amino acids in a matter of four to five days. So I've observed as much as 70 units of nitrogen in one application being converted in as quickly as a four to five day process, as long as.

The soil has enough available sugar.

So when you think about many of the growers that we are working with.

We'Re topping out at 150 units and often less.

If we want to split apply two applications, then 70 units is about the maximum that 70, 75 units would often be the maximum that I would have experience with.

Question Are there any situations where a.

Soil is not ready for no serum fertilizer being added? The answer is absolutely yes. If you don't have good functional biology, that is a recipe for disaster, and.

The way that you can identify that.

And know that is to conduct a Haney analysis to see exactly what's happening, what's going on. This is not a situation we don't have to guess.

We have tools and technology and analysis.

Available to us today that we didn't have five years ago or 10 years ago. Between the Haney soil analysis and the plant SAP analysis, we have the tools.

Today that we can understand exactly what.

The plant's nutritional requirements are and what the soil's capacity to deliver nutrients is so we don't have to guess. Conduct a Haney analysis and you'll know really quickly whether you're in a situation.

Where you can't, where you can get.

Away without adding any starter fertilizers or not. All right, those are the questions in the Q and A. I hope that you found the information valuable and useful.

And I look forward to speaking with.

You and having a conversation again on webinars in the future. If you have any further questions, I would refer you to the podcast interview that I did with Dr. James White.

And also subscribe to the blog@john kemp.com.

Where I'm going to be describing a lot of these processes and nitrogen management in particular in a series of blog.

Posts coming out over the next month or so. If you have any further questions that.

You would like for me to respond to, you can email me directly john kempf.com and I'm happy to write a blog post about it and add it to the list.

So thank you very much. Have a wonderful day, happy growing, and.

I look forward to speaking to you again soon.

Thanks everyone.