Mycorrhizae

Yesterday's topic leads right into today's, mycorrhizae. If I type that a few times, maybe I will remember how to spell it! It took me a few months to learn to spell trychaderma.

Mycorrhizae are part of the beneficial soil fauna that live in healthy soil. They colonize on plant roots and help the plant taken in water which contains the nutrients they need to grow and prosper.

These terms have become more mainstream since no-till farming was reinvented with corn planting in Kentucky in the early 60's. Many of us throw the term around trying to explain the benefits of no-till but few of us have any working knowledge of how it works.

I mentioned on NewAgTalk's Crop Talk that I met Larry Simpson of Mycorrhizal Applications Inc at Farm Science Review this week. He challenged me that he could make me even more money than T-22, SabrEx and America's Best Soybean inoculant has. Now that is a tall order but I am willing to take the challenge.

Matt Hintz of Amherst, Wisconsin added this story to the discussion and made me wanting to try it, too.

I have to focus on harvest first, and getting my dry fertilizer and maybe gypsum on. If I am lucky I want to do this before the notill seeder plants rye, wheat, oats and/or barley to sustain my soil. That's a real tall order all by itself but it made me think.

If I an increase mycorrhizae on these new seedling roots, I can improve my soil all winter before planting again next spring. Trychaderma has added bushels of corn, soybeans, wheat and barley to our income. Maybe mycorrhizae can add a few more?

This a different picture of healthy hyphae compared to the one in the linked article. It makes me think about what I can't see under my feet as I don't work over a microscope.

There is always something new to think about!

Ed