How Fertilizer Damages the Soil

[NJCher]

I've been gardening organically for a couple decades now and only once have I come across a good explanation for why not to use fertilizers. That explanation is in an old issue of Organic Gardening, squirreled away somewhere in my attic. Consequently, I feel there needs to be more explanation for what fertilizer does to the soil.

I think many people have the partial picture, but lack the big picture. Thus this morning, while perusing Google news (under which I have a key news word "gardening" set up), this article turned up. While I think it's one of those articles written to drive traffic to her Web site, the information fits with the other explanations I've read of fertilizer. Despite being written in a rather casual style, the information is still good.

Furthermore, this article explains the history of fertilizer. Here are a few choice excerpts but I highly recommend reading the entire article. In fact, I've saved it.

in 1918 a German scientist named Fritz Haber was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for synthesizing ammonia. Unfortunately Herr Doktor Haber's work was more focused on munitions, but the process eventually led to producing nitrogen based fertilizers (This follows the natural path of ammonia from decomposition being turned into nitrite, and then to nitrate by little organisms known as nitrobacters). Suddenly hyper-fertility was possible; the land could be made to produce far beyond what it had been capable of. Many thought that better and better chemicals would surely help feed the planet.

Exhausting the Soil As the Okies of the Dust Bowl found out, this was no magic bullet. Higher yields and deeper plowing burned out the soil faster than ever. More fertilizer was required just to maintain yields at a current rate, and then when the weather turned bad, the depleted, lifeless soil simply began to vanish in the air as dust storms blasted through. When it did rain the dust would hold the moisture to the surface so that yet more soil ran into streams and rivers. Even in the Midwest, the topsoil of a thousand generations of prairie plants was disappearing at an alarming rate.


This is a pic of an abandoned farm from the dust bowl in Oklahoma.
There are more pics of the dust bowl at:
http://memory.loc.gov/learn/features/timeline/depwwii/dustbowl/dbphotos.html

How synthetic fertilizers damage the soil

Farmers were getting decreasing yields and having to spend more and more to get even those. Soil conservation districts sprang up to advocate contour plowing and fallow areas, but the real underlying problem, one that continues to today is simply this: The chemical fertilizers are made from ammonia salts. Synthesized nitrogen is salt based, and anyone familiar with what salt build-up does to soil knows that isn't a good thing . For those not familiar, since Roman times salt has been used to eliminate soil fertility PERMANENTLY. They salted Carthage when they conquered it and today modern Libya is still a desert, despite the descriptions of Carthage as some of the most fertile areas around the Mediterranean.

Here's the link:

http://www.dailyindia.com/show/27002.php




Cher

[Pathwalker]

1. My grandparents were share cropper farmers

who left Oklahoma during the dust bowl days, and I have old photos of the entire family, then 25 strong, rode on and in one old car to California. It was EXACTLY like the Grapes of Wrath - exactly.
My grandfather would not allow fertilizers to touch his garden, and we never had a garbage disposal, just an old metal bucket for the kitchen scraps that we lugged to a different part of the garden, according to his instructions. He claimed those commercial fetilizers killed the soil in Oklahoma - this proves he was right!
Thanks, Cheri, for this information!!

[Imalittleteapot]

2. Use organic fertilizers like

fish emulsion, seaweed and poultry droppings. Composted grass, leaves and vegetables are the best thing you can add to your gardens and lawns. If you can't find organic products locally, there are plenty of suppliers online. Search "organic fertilizer".

Thanks Cher. Great post. Here's a kick for some more attention. :kick: