Growing Green Manure. Part 1

2024 Author: Sebastian Paterson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:47

Pulses - green fertilizer

A healthy lifestyle involves, first of all, the use of organic products. And where to get them, if in the practice of agriculture, mineral fertilizers, herbicides and pesticides are increasingly used, which not only worsen the nutritional value of products, but also reduce the resistance of crops to pests and diseases. Green fertilizers can come to the rescue.

They have been used by our ancestors since time immemorial. This technique, borrowed from China, began to spread in the Mediterranean countries already in the days of Ancient Greece. However, in the era of enthusiasm for mineral fertilizers, since the middle of the last century, green fertilizers have receded into the background and are not used by everyone.

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The main purpose of green fertilizer is to enrich the soil with organic matter and nitrogen, with the maximum rejection of the introduction of readily soluble mineral fertilizers, especially mineral nitrogen, from chemical means of protection against pests and diseases. There are several ways to reduce or minimize the use of mineral fertilizers in your garden. Let's talk about them.

First of all, this is the cultivation of special plants called siderates. Their green mass, rich in nitrogen and organic matter, as well as roots, still functioning at the time of plowing into the soil, represent the required fertilizer.

Under the influence of microorganisms, plant residues decompose and turn into humus, which is found only in the soil, mineral substances, for example, phosphorus, carried by the roots of plants from deeper layers of the soil, turns into a form available for subsequent plants. The water and air regime of the soil is improved due to the loosening and structuring action of the plant root system. A crop grown for green manure does not produce any production in a year of cultivation, but heals the soil for 5-6 years.

Siderata are not inferior to manure in their ability to enrich the soil with humus and nitrogen, but they are inferior in terms of enrichment with other nutrients, since how much the plant took mineral substances from the soil, it returns the same amount after dying off. Therefore, green fertilization does not completely exclude the introduction of manure or compost enriched with potassium, phosphorus, calcium and trace elements, but it allows you to reduce their dose.

In organic farming, they prefer to apply mineral fertilizers to the compost, and not to the soil, so that, with the help of microorganisms, they are converted into a more useful form of organic compounds. Also, the surplus of plant residues of green manure is better used for composting and mulching, since if a large amount of fresh green mass is embedded in the soil, it will not decompose, but sour, besides, a very large amount of nitrogen can have a negative effect on the main crop.

How much to close up the green mass is a matter of intuition and experience of the farmer, since it depends on many factors. Fresh plant residues almost always contain inhibitors of growth and germination, so you need to wait until they are processed by microorganisms.

In the conditions of the North-West of Russia, green fertilizer is covered up in the fall, after the beginning of frost. The seeding depth on light soils is 12-15 cm, on heavy soils 6-8 cm, with deeper digging, plant residues do not decompose, but turn into a peat-like mass.

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Green manure plants

Siderata are divided into two groups - these are nitrogen accumulators, that is, leguminous plants, which, with the help of nodule bacteria, are able to fix nitrogen in the air and enrich the soil with it, and nitrogen-saving plants, non-leguminous plants that enrich the soil with organic matter by decomposing their mass and keeping nitrogen from washing out.

Leguminous crops are of great interest as nitrogen accumulators, since they have the ability to grow rapidly and form a large green mass, are undemanding to soil fertility and use poorly soluble nutrients from the subsoil with the help of a well-developed root system. They are able to accumulate up to 300-350 kg of nitrogen per hectare, their green mass quickly decomposes in the soil.

In this group of crops there are early maturing forms suitable for intermediate crops. In the North-West region, lupine, fodder beans, peas, spring and winter vetch, and rank can be used. They meet all the requirements for green manure, except for the rank, which is difficult to obtain seeds in large farms. However, in small garden plots, when manually harvesting the lower beans, it is possible to obtain a sufficient amount of conditioned seeds.

Here is a brief description of the crops used as green manure

Lupine. In Russia, four types of annual lupine are used: narrow-leaved (blue), yellow, white and partially variable, as well as one type of perennial. Among all the plants used as green manure, lupins occupy one of the first places, and on sandy soils it is the main crop for green fertilization. Lupins enrich the soil with organic matter, nitrogen and phosphorus. It is believed that microorganisms live on the roots of lupine, which can convert insoluble phosphates into a form accessible to plants. Green fertilizer from lupine is close to manure in nutritional value. Lupine is considered to be the best predecessor for strawberries. For late sowing, in July, the plants are planted in autumn, and in areas with mild winters in spring.

Lupine angustifolia has a high growth rate and develops a deeper root system (150-200 cm) than other lupins, and it is also more resistant to cold. Most suitable for northern regions, grows well on sandy loam soils, is not sensitive to soil acidity.

Lupine yellow of all lupins is the least picky about the soil and is not very sensitive to acidity, but does not tolerate the alkaline reaction of the soil, it requires good moisture.

White lupine is the most demanding on soil fertility and is not very sensitive to acidity. Of all types, lupine gives the largest green mass.

Lupine is perennial (perennial). Moisture-loving, light-loving and cold-resistant plant. Its biological potential for nitrogen fixation is high and makes it possible to obtain up to 600 c / ha of green mass without the use of nitrogen fertilizers. Like annual lupins, it is able to assimilate sparingly soluble compounds of phosphorus and other elements. There are several forms of using perennial lupine as a green fertilizer: mowing, creating a deposit, sowing lupine under the cover, plowing for a subsequent crop.

Forage beans are a valuable crop for green manure, especially on heavy clay soils, where lupins grow poorly and are affected by fungal diseases. They are superior to peas and vetch in protein content and digestibility. In favorable years, with sufficient precipitation, the yield of green mass of beans can reach 500 c / ha.

Peas, the most widespread food legume, fodder and vegetable crop in the Northwest, can also be used as an organic fertilizer. For this, varieties of forage use are usually sown. In favorable years, it yields more than 350 c / ha of green mass, which, in addition to the high nitrogen content, is rich in various mineral elements.

Sowing vetch (spring). In addition to being a very valuable feed for farm animals, vetch is a good green manure in organic farming. With the decomposition of green fertilizer, the soil is enriched with nitrogen and organic substances, the vetch is well mineralized, providing further crops with nutrients, the soil structure, its physical and chemical properties, thermal regime are improved, and the absorption capacity increases.

The main form of using vetch for green fertilization in the North-West region is its clean sowing, followed by plowing of green mass. It is often used in combination with oats, field peas (pelushka), or broad beans. In orchards and vegetable gardens, vetch, vetch-oat or other mixtures can be sown in free areas to obtain mass. The action of vetch green fertilizer is not inferior to the action of manure and lasts for 4-5 years.

Shaggy vetch (winter), like all legumes, enriches the soil with nitrogen and organic matter. The furry vetch has four ecological types of varieties: spring, semi-summer, winter and semi-winter. Spring forms are characterized by rapid growth at the beginning of the growing season. In the conditions of the Leningrad region, with spring sowing, they bloom in 45-50 days, with autumn sowing, they go into winter with a shoot height of 30-35 cm.

In typical winter forms, plants have a creeping bush shape with a large number of shoots of the first and second orders. When sown in spring, they bloom 80-95 days after germination. With winter sowing, shoots grow slowly and go into winter with a stem length of 13-18 cm. The winter hardiness of such plants is high, up to 100%, even under unfavorable wintering conditions. Intermediate forms in the Northwest can overwinter only under optimal conditions.

The grass seed in the northern regions of Russia gives a very large green mass, comparable to the green mass of lupins. Despite the fact that it is difficult to obtain conditioned seeds in our region, it is profitable to use a rank for green fertilization on personal plots.