Soil Health Issues in the Farm - Case Study Example

Surname: Presented to Institution Name, Location Date Soil health Introduction Introduction Situation for background information Soil health can be defined as the state at which soil meets the range of the ecosystems functions that are totally appropriate for the environment. The term soil health is used in describing the state of the soil in sustaining of animal and plant diversity and productivity, the maintenance of water and air equality, and giving support to the human health and habitation. John and Michelle Williams own a mixed farm within the plains of Liverpool, near the Werris Creek. The farm produces a range of products that come from beef cattle and the irrigated crops. Bushland covers the small pockets of the remaining part of the land. The farm is found on the upper parts of the Namoi Catchment on the tributary of the Mooki River, and and it has red dermasols on the slopes and the black vertisols along the lowers slopes of the river adjacent to the creek. The land neighboring is used mainly for coal mining, intensive livestock, including the piggeries and poultry. There is also an expanding rural development from the centers such as Tamworth and Quirindi. The creek part of the Mooki River which covers the headwaters of the Namoi River and some parts of the Murray Darling basin. John Michelle has been always farming in the area for quite some time. In the recent few years, the farm has been direly affected by long droughts. On the following year’s batters, rains were experienced, in fact during the summer seasons here were heavy rains but were followed by a dry autumn. John on his part has showed some winter crops on the black vertisols, health introduced some pasture and clover on the paddocks that had a posture run down problems and located within the red dermasols. Within the season, john noticed that the plant she had planted had not developed well in places. He decided to pull out the plants in the places that they were stunted; during the process he noticed that the plants had poor development of roots. The end of the season is approaching, and the crops have been harvested. John also noticed that some of the plants had turned yellow and stunted at the beginning of the season. There was also large under development of the clover in the pasture that was grown in the paddock on the red dermasols. The harvester had a yield monitor installed, and their cords that john received shown that he had patchy crop yield mainly in the lower regions of the landscape. Soil health issues in the farm Definition of issues Soil salinity refers to the salt content of the soil; it is natural for a certain type of soil to have a particular amount of sales. These salts can be toxic especially when they are in excessive concentrations. Soil Ph is the measure of alkalinity or acidity of the soil; soil Ph is the master of variable that controls many chemical processes (Voroney, 2006). Soil fertility refers to the amount of organic and mineral components that are required by the plants within the soil, different types of crops requires different types of nutrients and minerals. Soil compaction refers to the process by which soil causes the densification while air is displaced from its pores within the soil grains. The above defined terms are the most significant soil health issues that are affecting John and Michele Williams farm. The quality of soil in johns and Michele farms might have been caused by a number of treats that include climate change, sealing, compaction, erosion, landslides, organic matter decline, contamination, and the change is soil biodiversity. The regions where john and Michele’s farm is has been experiencing drought for some time this means that climate has taken place causing drought and hence affected soil quality. The modern agricultural practices have increased the rate of acidification such practices done in john, and Michele’s farms include use of fertilizer irregularly. Product removal together with Lucerne and silage production within the far has caused soil acidity and destruction of soil structure. The animals that are kept within the farm are also a likely reason for acidity of the soil. Lack of proper crop practices within the firm is likely to be the reason for poor soil structure from the situation given it is clear that farm practices were not good, and deterioration might have caused compaction of the soil. Soil health is an imperative consideration that needs to be taken cared of carefully in order to enable development of the plants and good harvest (Ritter. 2009). As we have noticed in the case of John and Michelle Williams farm, foliage discoloration and distortion manifest itself due to deficiencies of nutrients in the soil. For plants to grow in a healthy and productive way then, it should be able to get enough mixture of nutrients, micronutrients are the nutrients required by plants in larger quantities. The macronutrients that most plants need are nitrogen, phosphorus, calcium, sulfur and magnesium. Plants obtain hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon mainly forms water, air and sunlight. The remaining nutrients that are needed by plants are obtained from soil the table below show elements that are needed by plants (Doran, 2002). http://info.cycadpalm.com/bid/57658/How-to-Fertilize-Cycads-Part-1 Another critical component of the soil health is the soil Ph. Each and every other plant grown needs a specific range of pH to be able to get the nutrients in the soil. Some plants are more a fuss than others but if the he pH of the soil is either too acidic or alkaline the plant will neither take in nutrients no matter how rich the soil maybe. Just as the graph bellow indicate that low pH affects the availability of the nutrients, with all the most important nutrients tied up with the low soil pH the abilities of the plants to resist diseases, lawn’s color and vigor is reduced (Kellogg, 2003 http://weedmanlawnclippings.blogspot.com/ Discoloration of the leaves of crops in the John and Michelle William’s farm is due to problems of nutrients or the environment (Dance, 2008). The yellow color of the plants in the farm is due to choruses that has affected the tissue. This is the lack of the essential green pigment by the leaves. The possible cause of this particular condition could be poor drainage, damaged root, high soil ph., compacted roots and deficiency of nutrients. John noticed that the roots there were penniless root development of in the plants, and this was one of the causes of the discoloration of the plants (Voroney, 2006). good fruits (Doran, 2002). http://www.ehow.com/facts_6016475_health-issues-black-mold-mildew.html the stunted growth by the plants has several causes including lack of nutrients in the soil, soil pollution, water insufficiency, improper lighting and many other (Ritter. 2009). Soil pollution cause imbalances of nutrients in the soil, reduction of decomposition and then lower the health quality of the soil. In the case of johns and Michelle Williams farm, the cause could probably be due to lack of nutrients and soil pollution. The neighboring land is being used as a mine for coal and other animal farming activities. The mining of coal could be a pollution factor that could have caused stunted growth in the farm. Lack of nutrients such as nitrogen, potassium, calcium, magnesium, sulfur and many others is also another probable reason for the stunted growth (Voroney, 2006). Poor soil health such as compaction and low moisture content makes the roots hard to penetrate through the soil with ease to collect nutrients this makes the roots develop poorly and plants to be stunted the graph above shows the graph of resistance against moisture content. Soil health issues justified solutions it is important to remedy soil health issues very fast to avoid losses being made. Soils with very low levels of the organic matter gets easily compacted compared to soils that possess adequate reserves of humus that help in keeping the network of spaces always open within the soil (Voroney, 2006). To reduce compaction and much other soil health issues it important that humus be added to the soil in good quantities. Manure and the soil improvers are great as they provide a well-controlled release of the nutrients that are needed by the plants while at the same time, they increase the beneficial soil population and life, this will greatly bring down the chances of occurrence of diseases and the parasitic fungi (Kellogg, 2003). http://www.constructionknowledge.net/sitework/sitework_soils_and_geology.php from the graph shown above, it is clear that too little moisture content then the soil does not compact too well. Addition of moisture in the compaction process then the soil will get much more firm. If too much moisture gets into the soil, it is likely that it will not compact well. This might be the case of john’s farm after the heavy rains the soils might not have compacted well (Kellogg, 2003). The table above shows the estimated nutrient content in various manure from animals. Before the application of manure or fertilizer, it is important to know the conditions of the soil that way the application will be to the correct estimations needed for batter growth of plants in a healthier way (Voroney, 2006). Conducting a soil Ph. Test is imperative, and soil that is either too acidic or basic is not good for crops. Different crops need diverse soil pH conditions like vegetables need slightly acidic soils and one can always add calcium sulfate and to reduce the acidity of the soils one can always add calcium carbonate. Although adding chemicals to the farm can greatly help in increasing productivity, sometimes it is important to note that chemical fertilizers and pesticides can damage microorganism that are critical in the health in the health of the soil. Soil salinity could also be another problem that john need to consider when solving his soil problems the table below shows the effects of soil pH on the growth of plants (Kellogg, 2003). Testing for salinity in the soils is cheap and easy, conducting this test is paramount. Salinity can be caused by either improper irrigation and reclamation is quite feasible. Most of their acclamation methods of treating saline soils include leaching or flushing of soils with fresh water. Sufficient water has to be used to dissolve excess salts in the soils, and the rate of infiltration of the flow of water or flow of water in the soil is the main determinant of the speed at which water has to be applied to remedy the problem (Voroney, 2006). Conclusion In order to achieve best harvest from the farm John and Michelle Williams have to undertake proper measure to prevent losses from their farm one of the most important is carrying out acidity test and applying relevant solution to the problem. The other is conducting salinity test this is one of the most problematic issues, and it would the most probable as the farm is under irrigation and salinity problems are likely to be present. Application of manure where possible on the farm should become a priority for them. References European Union. (54-98). Microbial diversity and soil functions. European Journal of Soil Science, 655–670. Dance, A. (2008). "Soil ecology: What lies beneath?" Nature 455 (7214), 897-987. Doran, J. a. (2002). Renewed vision for Earth Scientists “Sustaining Earth and its People. Translating Science into Practice, 45-67. Kellogg, C. (2003). A challenge to American soil scientists. Soil Science Society of America Proceedings journal, 56-109. All, R. (2004). "Soil Carbon Sequestration Impacts on Global Climate Change and Food Security." Science 304 (5677), 1623–1627. Ritter. M. E. (2009). Factors Affecting Soil Development, Soil Systems. The Physical Environment: an Introduction to Physical Geography journal, 567-987. Role, D. K. (2003). Soil Biology in Improving Soil Quality. Soil Biology Journal, 78-195. Union, E. (2008). 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