Test Results In...A+!

I can hardly believe it. We got our results from the soil test in and it was incredibly good. We have increased our organic matter of the soil from about 2% to 7.1% in a single season! Organic matter in the soil is the water, nutrient, and microbial sponge that releases and protects the crop plants. Having a fertile soil is the mainstay of an organic crop. Our cover crop winter rygrass and our horse manure has greatly increased the fertility of our trial plot. We have the equivalent of 186 lbs of Nitrogen, 736 lbs of P2O5 (phosphorous oxide), and 439 lbs of K2O (Potash) per acre. Those numbers are very high. In fact much higher than needed to grow a decent crop. Our nitrate nitrogen was only 7 parts per million which means that the soluble form of nitrogen that plants use is very low. All our nitrogen is tied up in organic matter that has not released yet. Amazingly the recommendations from the agricultural lab was to add 100lbs of Nitrogen per acre and 20 lbs of potash to release those nutrients to the plants quicker. I called and asked why they would want even more fertilizer on the field and they said that it would depend on how the weather went if that fertility in the soil would release to the plants. I think that I will supplement some of trials and not other to see if there is indeed a difference. The crops are growing very well and looking very nice so far. We have little baby squash, cucumbers, and melons forming on the plants.