In a world increasingly concerned about the financial and environmental cost of chemical fertilizers, there is a growing field of research seeking answers to soil fertility through microbiology.
In this arena, scientists are working to find out how to support the natural microbes in the soil in such a way that they in turn support the growth of productive crops. Their work could provide several important benefits to the environment through improved cropping systems.
In recent years, the cost of fertilizer has contributed to the soaring price of grain and pasture crops and, subsequently, the meat that is fed from those crops. If the need for fertilizer can be reduced on these crops, the farm will save not only in the reduced purchase cost of the fertilizer material but also in the labor, fuel, and machinery use required to apply it to the crop.
Microbial systems enable plants to develop better access to existing nutrients in the soil, making critical elements like nitrogen, phosphorous, potassium, boron, and others more available to the plant so that it can thrive without the introduction of additional fertilizer material.
While precision agriculture has made great strides in targeting fertilizer rates and types to the specific parts of a field, not every operation utilizes that technology and instead continues to split the difference with a uniform rate of fertilizer application across a decidedly non-uniform field. On farms that do utilize smart technology, the system requires an investment in equipment as well as larger numbers of individual soil fertility tests to drive the data.
The result of the imperfections in both systems is that some areas are under-fertilized and others over-fertilized, with the latter releasing the excess into the soil and the water table.
One of the common side effects of excess fertilizer, especially nitrogen, is an increased rate of fungal infections in plants. These pathogens thrive in fast-growing tissue that has not had time to develop a rigid leaf surface to resist invaders, and excessive nitrogen applications are the most common cause for the rapid development of tender, unprotected plant tissue.
As causal organisms come into contact with exposed leaf surfaces on the plant, infection quickly develops. As a result, the excess fertilizer that should be creating additional crop yields instead contributes to disease development that can ultimately reduce yields and even lead to crop failure or forces the application of additional chemicals in the form of fungicides intended to keep the disease at bay. Even with aggressive treatment, the best outcome is reduced spread of the disease to other plants, as these treatments do not reinvigorate stunted plants or allow damaged tissue to regenerate.
As the field of environmental microbiology continues to advance, we can expect to see these benefits more accruing to the entire farm and food industry. The use of microbial activity to increase the availability of plant nutrients in the soil could have impacts in developed and developing nations alike.
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