When are you done Building Soil?

[Stocker Steve]

I purchased some run down ground five years ago and have been building ever since:

First year I put on ag lime and turkey litter, and balanced that with some K. Grew corn on all the high ground.
Second year I put on more ag lime, alot of K, along with sulfur and Boron. Seeded down to alfalfa/clover/grass mix. Soil re tests did not agree with the previous lime reccomendation and turkey litter was not longer avaible...
Third year I put beet lime on most of it, along with K, S, and boron. Soil re tests did not aways agree with the previous lime reccomendation.
Fourth year I put a little P on part of it, along S and boron. My best 2 paddocks showed 3 % organic matter, 6.3 ph, and no inputs re required for a 4 ton yield :banana:

Plan to bale feed bought in hay this winter to continue building organic matter, and also looking into foliar feeding.

What is a practical ph target for a 50% grass, 25% clover, 25% alfalfa stand?
Is there anything else I should be considering?

 

[Angus Cowman]

as long as you are taking something off of the pasture you will need to put something back on
might just be minnimal or on 2 yr rotation but I don't beleive you can keep up high production without some inputs

instead of building you can go into maintence mode

 

[shaz]

Sounds like your topsoil is better than much of mine.

What is your foliar feeding plan?

 

[Stocker Steve]

What is your foliar feeding plan?

I have clay soil with lots and lots of rocks. Good land for this area but too far north for long season/high yielding row crops. Because of the short summers we do not have much of a summer slump, and so annual forage production is more on a par with some southern areas than corn production. Two cuttings on better land this (wet) year totaled about 4.5 tons/acre.
The local grass fed marketing company has pushed foliar feeding for a while. Basic idea is that, regardless of the soil mineralization test results, there are some things that are not readily available. What you put on is supposed to be based on forage - not soil - testing.
Some Nebraska and Missouri grazers are have recently been working with spraying on raw milk. Theory is that this super charges the bug life in the soil.
My thought is to apply about a ton/acre of beet lime every other year, apply some al sulfate plus boron right at green up the alternate year, and do some test strips with foliar in late June when growth is still vigorous.

 

[purecountry]

Where do you get your soil tests done Steve? 6.4 for your pH is ideal. 3% O.M. is quite respectable, and if you really want to check how good things are cooking, test your Brix with a refractometer. If you're not familiar with one, it's a little tube for testing the sugar content of the plant. You squeeze in a drop or 2 of leaf juice and look in the scope to see the reading. If it's high, your soils are doing great. You cannot get high Brix nutritious crops or forage without healthy soil.

As for foliar feeding we've been wanting to try it, just haven't had it in the budget yet. I think doing some test strips is a good idea. I was planning on doing it with some GSR Calcium - which we are very low on - and then also some liquid fish and sea minerals.

 

[johndeerefarmer]

Never.

We have been building ours for over 70 years. Still trying to recover from the cotton farmers that farmed here in the twenties and thirties. Seems that fertilizer either cost too much in those days or wasn't readily available.

Seriously, as was said above. Every grass crop that we produce "mines" the soil, you gotta put back what you take.

 

[john250]

r.e. the foliar feeding. Very expensive per unit of nutrient. Plus application cost. Spend the money on bringing your soil test closer to optimum. Fertilize your best acres. Check the result for a year.

 

[terra8186]

We use ag lime around here which is just pulverized limestone. The way I understand it is: It just starts working the first year and continues working for a couple of years. Maybe you are not getting results because of this. Every time you put fertilizer down, you are also lowering your PH. My target ph is 6.5.

I have been building mine for 3 years. Every year I have it right until I find out my yield and find another problem. Reminds me of a Detroit Lions T-Shirt I saw: "Rebuilding since 59"

 

[dun]

We use ag lime around here which is just pulverized limestone. The way I understand it is: It just starts working the first year and continues working for a couple of years. Maybe you are not getting results because of this. Every time you put fertilizer down, you are also lowering your PH. My target ph is 6.5.

I have been building mine for 3 years. Every year I have it right until I find out my yield and find another problem. Reminds me of a Detroit Lions T-Shirt I saw: "Rebuilding since 59"

You're correct about the lime working for a couple of years. We test every other year and the ph keeps going up for about 4 years then levels off or drops a little.
Chemical fertilizers will lower the ph basicly because they are acidic.