As a foliar application you would plant spring or fall plots and then spray onced they are up and estsbished pretty well, gernetally 3-4 weeks after planting On spring plots you may have to spray earlier combined with some fish emulsion if the deer start hammering them. This will repel the deer and fertilize at the same time. Then I usually come back about 4-6 weeks later and spray the Sea90 a second time. I don't put anything down at the time of planting. However, the first couple of years you may want to put out the granular at the time of planting. After that you shouldn't have to use the granular but every 3-4 years.

Last year was the first year I had experimented with spring brassicas. I was having a hard time growing any brassicas during the fall due to browsing so I thought I would do a trial run during the spring to see if I could produce some rotten vegetable type biomass. I more less just threw some seed out toward the end of March and mowed over it when my cereal grains began to bolt. I’m going to try a couple different things this year I think. I may try to throw out some seed in another couple weeks just to see what happens.

They mature pretty quickly....I think it was a matter of a couple months. I did get some browsing but nothing like what we get in the fall. Mix in some radishes with them if you want more browsing. There's something about radishes that makes them more attractive than turnips.

Going to start adding some pics. The lighting could be a little better on this pic but you can still see the organic matter that has been built over the last few years in the top soil horizon. Also notice the scoop of dirt in the background that came from the hole. Like William said in an earlier post….organic matter is the key. All components are important but the foundation for all of these things we are discussing is rooted in building organic matter.

Is that a recent pic?

Yes...Pic was taken this morning.

Must be nice to have a field that dry.

Westflgator, where can i get fish emulsion? Also, does this stuff make your sprayer smell as bad as i think it will? Is so, how do you get rid of the smell? Run lemon juice thru it?

A 32oz bottle is $6-8 at Walmart. It goes a pretty good ways, just add until you get a pretty fishy smell from the sprayer.

As far a as the residual smell in the tank, I didn't notice a problem once it was rinsed, I noticed it more with the milk than the emulsion, but neither really caused a problem in my opinion.

I actually stumbled up on this by accident. Last year the deer were hammering my SH as it was coming up and I was afraid they were going to kill it before it got going good. I had been reading about milorganite for years but hadn't tried it. I was going to go that route but was at my mother's helping her in the garden and she uses the fish emusion as a fertilizer in her organic garden and the smell was very strong while she was spraying. So I began to think that this would most likely repel deer, because it sure was repelling me at the time she was spraying it. So I decided to give it a try and it seemed to work perfectly for me. I only sprayed once and it kept the deer off of it for about 2-3 weeks and then I began to notice a the deer traffic starting to pick back up after that time. That was just enough time, was very cost effective, and it was easy to put out since I was going to be spraying anyway at that time...

Good info, i appreciate it. Be careful spraying into the wind, i guess you could repel your wife. LOL

CNC,

Have you tried adding organic matter directly to the fields like woods chips, hay, or leaves? My neighbor has a tree business. I love for him to dump a load of wood chips in my backyard. Given a little time and some help from clovers and vetch, it turns into black gold.

Here is another link that really explains everything in a nutshell that CNC is promoting with building organic matter, and the principles and methods that I am using to expedite the growth of the microbial populations which ramp up the activity within the soil/decaying thatch. This link doesn't get into the organic matter as much as it deals with the necessity of the additional trace minerals & the healthy populations of microbes that are needed to feed the plants. It also gives a really good explanation of the importance of the sugar content in the plant and the importance of testing the BRIX. He doesn't get into sea minerals in this video, but you can see the importance of adding those trace minerals back to the soil from his explanation of what it takes to reach optimal plant health. Along with the things listed above he also provides a really good explanation of how our traditional methods of fertilization with synthetic fertilizers are harmful to the soil and it's natural processes. He is mostly dealing with fruits and vegetables in the video, but the concepts apply to all plants. Watch the video in the link provided below, I think some of you will find it interesting.

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2013/09/22/high-performance-agriculture.aspx

My question is this regarding organic matter. What difference does it make if you till it vs no till. The plant material ends up in the soil in either case.

When you till it adds oxygen to the soil and speeds up the decaying process. In other words it deplets your OM faster.

Not to mention losing quality soil due to erosion when you till.

If you have sandy soil and till the OM in, the organic material will actually oxidize in the sand and give you worse soil. It's better to build an organic layer on top

Think about it like this...I don't know if you've ever had a worm bed, but the worms will feed on top where the OM has been added to the top. Not only do the earth worms feed off of this OM so do all the other microscopic critters in the soil that has been talked about above. With the OM being concentrated so will the digested waste being deposited by all the critters feeding on it, this is what is so nutrient rich and in an available form for the plants to utilize. Another way to look at it is with composting. If you take all the materials in a compost pile before they are composted and just scatter them and cut them in, they will not breed the same beneficial fungi and bacteria that they will if they are in a left piled together. It's a little different in that these layers aren't think enough to go through a heat like a compost pile but there is a decaying layer there that creates a better environment for the critters to flourish.

I haven't....although what I'm doing in the summer is more less just growing my own hay. I wish I was a little closer to a chicken industry. One of the benefits of adding chicken litter is that you're also adding organic matter with the nutrients as well as a vibrant microbial community in the manure.

Picture sharing.....taken this afternoon.

In regards to adding organic matter, it seems to me if you are simply mulching you existing crops, you aren't adding appreciably to the soil. It would seem to me that you are simply putting back what the plant took. I would think you'd have to add organic matter from outside the system to make dramatic gains.

William, look at the video in the link that I posted earlier in this thread in regards to no-till/throw n mow. That video will explain more than we can in a post. Those farmers in that video have reduced their input by 70% in some cases simply by utilizing a diversity in cover crops. Those cover crops are simply rolled down into a mat of OM, which then feeds the critters in the soil, that in turn feed the plants. It's not as much the plants feeding the plants, it's more about the OM feeding the microbial populations who then feed the plants.