02/12/2016
For the purpose of staff education I was asked by a large-scale farmer to relate in simple terms the number and volume of microbes in the soil - they have the planted 24 000 Cabernet Sauvignon young vines with my earthworm castings this September. They did this because they witnessed the astounding results of about 400 000 blueberries planted nearby over the past 4 years with my castings. 'A teaspoon of soil has more microbes than people on earth' was one quote I located. Another estimate was that 1 ml of soil had more than 10 billion microbes. Whatever it is a mammoth number. 33 000 different bacterial and archeal species on the roots of sugar-beet not to mention all the other microbial species. It is so heartening that commercial farmers are becoming more aware of the importance of soil biology and the benefits.
