To understand organic garden you need to understand Mother Nature and respect her ways..|
JEFF COX
FOR THE PRESS DEMOCRAT
Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed.
--Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
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You can often hear people say, “Back before agricultural chemicals were introduced, all food was organic.”
That’s no true. And here’s why:
In the 19th century and before, gardeners and farmers didn’t use many if any chemicals. Almost all of today’s chemical armamentarium hadn’t been invented yet. But once the modern era of growing food and flowers using a wide range of agricultural chemicals arrived with the introduction of DDT in 1939, the sterilization of farmland and garden soil became the standard way to protect crops and ensure bountiful harvests.
Pesticides killed the insects. Herbicides killed the weeds. Fungicides killed the molds and mildews. Farm animals that developed disease were given antibiotics that killed the disease-causing microbes. Their manure ceased to be returned to the soil, now replaced by synthetic fertilizer made in ammonia factories.
Today, nearly 80% of the nitrogen found in human tissues originated in these energy-intensive fertilizer factories.
Nature, however, reacts to attempts to kill her creations by finding ways to preserve them.
Pesticides kill susceptible insects, but there are always some resistant insects that proliferate, requiring even more toxic pesticides to kill them. It’s a vicious cycle. Herbicides like atrazine and glyphosate cause cancer, leading the Bayer company, which makes glyphosate-based Roundup, to agree to a settlement of $10 billion for the cancers caused by the product.
Antibiotics used on farm animals kill disease organisms, except for those resistant strains that require more toxic antibiotics to control them, eventually giving us the antibiotic-resistant diseases that plague our hospitals.
Push hard on nature and she will push back, escalating the contest until she wins.
Understanding the complex web of life
Organic growers take a different approach.
The organic method is far more than just eschewing agricultural chemicals. It’s a way of farming and gardening based on health through understanding the complex web of life that nature creates when allowed to operate without disruption.
It starts with the health of the soil. Healthy plants grow in that soil, and healthy animals (including us) eat those plants. Health works its way up the food chain from the soil to the organic food on our plates.
What is healthy soil? It’s a soil that’s being fed dead leaves, grass clippings, hay or anything that was once living plant tissue.
Trillions of soil microorganisms in every shovelful of organic soil digest the plant matter, releasing its nutrients in forms that plant roots absorb. Actively decaying plant matter brings life to the soil.
Some microbes take nitrogen from the air, and create nitrogen-rich fertilizer for free, with no factories involved.
A special fungus feeds off the sugary sap that exudes from plant roots. In return, the fungus extends its tendrils far into the soil, gathering water and phosphorus compounds that it feeds to the plants.
As microbes cause decay in dead plant matter, they naturally produce an acidic substance that dissolves minerals from soil particles — minerals that plants need to be healthy.
The result of this digestion is a substance called humus. If a particle of humus were the size of a Volkswagen, it would look like a ball composed of tunnels and trenches, folds, and surfaces in such abundance that if that particle were flattened out, it would cover several football fields.
The surfaces of the humus are negatively charged. Many of the most important nutrients in the water in the soil are positively charged and cling to the humus’s surfaces.
Irrigation or rains don’t wash these nutrients away because they cling so tightly. However, when plants take up those nutrients by absorbing them into their roots, the humus particles let go of the nutrients in sufficient quantities to replenish them in the soil water so the plants always have a healthy supply.
Scientists call this the cation exchange capacity. You get it for free if you bring your soil to life by feeding it actively decaying organic matter. Compost, for short.
The many virtues of mulch
Nature abhors bare soil.
That’s why after you turn up fresh soil in the spring, big tough weeds are often the first responders. And that’s why organic growers keep down weeds not with herbicides but with mulch — thick layers of dead plant matter, especially fall leaves — that prevent weeds from growing.
Or, some organic growers plow down the weeds. But remember, nature abhors bare soil, so plowing down weeds is not the best tactic.
But why does nature abhor bare soil? Because sunlight kills soil bacteria and nature loves a living soil full of life. It also heats and dries out bare soil much faster than mulched soil. And hot, dry soil is not conducive to growing most crops. And finally, because the mulch is dead plant matter and feeds the soil and its denizens as it decays.
