Many of the biological farming practices that we are just now implementing today were very much a part of the landscape as far back as 12,000 years ago. Climate change at the end of the last glaciation produced thick forest soils. Over thousands of years, the soil grew several feet thick depending on the region. Soil erosion began only after the introduction of the plow.
The ancient Greeks and Romans knew that manure spread on fields helped crop production. Early Arabic civilizations collected written knowledge about farming complementing nature. By 1815, England was importing bones from around the world, as bone meal had been recognized as a benefit to agriculture. This included many human bones, from the Empire’s brutal colonial wars. Bird droppings, known by the Spanish name guano, became popular fertilizers in the U.S. in the 1800s. Darwin discovered that worms not only helped make soil, but they also helped move it. Francis Chaboussou, an agronomist at the French National Institute of Agricultural Research, in 1985 wrote “Healthy Crops: A New Agricultural Revolution.” In reviewing numerous studies stretching over nearly 50 years, he demonstrated that the nutrient balance of crops affects their susceptibility to pests and disease, and increases in diseases were tied to heavy nitrogen fertilization.
After a long history of biological farming practices, why and when did we introduce synthetic nitrogen or ammonia? Nitrogen production got the biggest boost from World War II, as ammonia was one of the main ingredients in explosives. By the end of the war, the U.S. was producing 730,000 tons of ammonia each year, with the capacity to produce 1.6 million tons. When it was no longer needed for war production, the nitrogen-rich ammonia became the recommended fertilizer. It was cheap and contributed to an increase in crop production. Fewer farms were rotating crops in the 1940s, and with synthetic nitrogen they could continue to do so without depending on a healthy soil for crop production. However, the introduction of man-made crop production came at a cost. Our early farmland had soil organic matter north of 6%. This was highly productive soil that had the capacity to “absorb” the destruction of organic matter by synthetic fertilizers over time, but only for a while.
Eventually, our soils started to decline. We weren’t feeding the microbial world under foot. There was no carbon being added to the soil. If fact, plowing or tilling the soil was releasing the carbon back into the atmosphere. The natural cycle of the plant using solar energy to grow while taking a portion of that energy and channeling it back to the soil via root exudation was in complete disruption. The mineralization process — where the biology in the soil consumes the carbohydrates exudations from the plant in order to mineralize specific nutrients and trace elements back to the plant — was occurring at a declining rate. Our soil organic matter became depleted and the nutrients in our food declined. Synthetic nitrogen allowed us to expand our crop production but only as a short-term boost.
Today, with a greater understanding of biological practices, we not only have a sustainable plan but a smarter one where we can cut back on the use of synthetic fertilizers and limit their unintended damage to our soils. Biological products used in conjunction with conventional methods means you can use less synthetic fertilizers. In a world where these fertilizers have skyrocketed in cost, it’s a no-brainer. In our history, synthetic fertilizers may have served a purpose, but with the challenges we face today, the biological practices that served our societies well for centuries can continue to do so far into the future.
