Pevensey Farmers
Our soil lab was led by Tristan Leslie from Soil Mentor, who gave a fascinating presentation on how to use the Soil Mentor App to baseline and track your soils using a number of different Regen indicators, each corresponding to a different test or observation. After the presentation we headed out into Victoria’s field.
The first test we carried out was the infiltration test to estimate the rate at which runoff will infiltrate, or pass through, native soil. It’s an easy test to carry out requiring a short length of 4 inch pipe (banged in the ground), some water and a stop watch (to see how quickly the water disappears).
The quicker the water disappears, the greater the carrying capacity of your soil – allowing your soils to capture and store more water. Other tests carried out included looking at the rooting depth of the grass (by digging a hole on three sides and then prizing out a cross section of soil) and measuring the depth of the grasses (see photo above).
We also observed the rhizosheaths of the roots – an indicator of how active your soils are (a film on the root indicates more microbial associations) . We also looked at the nodulation of legumes and counted earthworms inputting the data into the app.
Helpfully the Soil Mentor App allows you pinpoint the exact location of your soil samples, allowing you to return to the same location at different times of the year or annually to take additional readings and build up a better understanding of whether your soils are improving or not.
To compare different areas of the farm we took readings in two separate fields, a permanent pasture (Victoria’s field) and a temporary grass ley below the house (House field). The temporary ley showed a great diversity of grasses and deeper rooting varieties such as chicory. Interestingly, the temporary grass ley appeared to indicate better results than the permanent pasture, with a faster time for the infiltration test and more active soils, as observed through the rhizosheaths and bigger nodulations on the legumes.
Tristan commented that the difference could possibly be explained by the management techniques carried out in the fields (in this case the temporary ley is grazed more frequently and also receives more FYM).
Tristan added that in his experience mob grazing cattle (short duration high density grazing with a longer than usual grass recovery period 40-100 days) has shown to rapidly improve soil health – citing the example of FAI farm in Oxfordshire where they managed to transform their soils in less than 4 years.
We concluded our day back at Moorhen cottage over some delicious homemade quiche, bread and local cheeses (Pevensey Blue and High Weald) made with Court Lodge Organic Mil. Everyone commented how they had learned a lot more about soil and what we can do to measure them. Members also discussed the importance of finding funding to carry out regular tests or baselining and how we could encourage the younger generation of farmers (or nature enthusiasts) to embrace tools like Soil Mentor.
For those that would like to watch the presentation please click here.
