October 7, 2025 • 41 mins
This episode is the audio from our October Masterclass: Key to Healthy, Living Soil and focuses on the importance of soil health in gardening, emphasizing the role of organic material, soil organisms, and sustainable practices. Our community discusses the EFS framework for maintaining healthy soil, the significance of understanding soil structure, and the impact of community engagement in gardening efforts. The session also highlights the need for eliminating chemicals and fostering a supportive gardening community.
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Brad
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:37):
Today is a special day.
(01:10):
So much number.
So we'd love to have you won 100meters at the end of October.
And we are making our way to ouropen 2020.
And now we have a October 2023and October.
(01:35):
October masterclass.
Each month we have a food, andthis month food and October is
healthy soil.
And this masterclass is allabout the healthy, thriving
soils that we have under ourfeet.
We're going to start out with alittle quiz.
And so I don't know, you're notreally required to use the
comments on this, but I wouldlike you to like shout out an
(01:57):
answer.
And the only way I can hear itis if you use comments.
So this is a true or false quizabout healthy living soils.
And so I'll give this a littlepreface on the fact that a lot
of people don't think aboutsoils as living.
A lot of people don't thinkabout soils as needing to be
healthy.
Soil is just there.
We walk on it, we grow things init.
(02:18):
We don't really need to do muchabout it, but there's so much
more going on in soil.
And there's so much morehappening, and it's really,
really critical for what we needto do to build healthy
landscapes.
And so I'm really happy that aswe're doing our weekly lessons
with members, that that issomething that the starting
place and the baseline for wherewe are going with things.
(02:39):
So with healthy living soils,it's really important to
recognize that there is so muchhappening under the soil.
And the more that we mess withsoil and the more that we use
chemicals on soil, and the morethat we try and control it, the
less healthy it becomes.
And so uh here are a couple justtrue and false questions here.
(03:00):
Statements is a better way tosay that, for soil.
So, true or false, onetablespoon of soil contains more
organisms than there are humanson the entire planet Earth.
So one tablespoon of soilcontains more organisms than
there are humans on the entireEarth.
Is that true or false?
Any guesses?
Thanks, Katie.
(03:21):
True.
Any others?
Liz goes for a true as well.
You guys are correct.
It is true.
There are uh way, way, way moreorganisms in just a tablespoon
of soil than there are humans onEarth.
And so I think that was a reallyinteresting place to start with
this because it's reallycritical to understand that all
(03:41):
those within your soil, thereare microbes, there are
nematodes, there are bacteria,there are viruses that are in
there.
There are lots of things thatare extremely healthy to our
ecosystem as it has evolved overtime.
And a few things that areunhealthy, for sure, for humans
and for other things, but thevast majority of it are all
good, healthy things.
Next question (04:02):
There is more carbon stored in the soil than
there is carbon stored in theatmosphere.
True or false?
There is more carbon stored inthe soil than there is carbon
stored in the atmosphere.
Look at you guys getting thehang of it.
I love all this.
Beautiful, beautiful, true,true, true.
Yep, all true.
Uh yeah, there is and this one Ithought was really fascinating
(04:27):
when I found this statistic as Iwas preparing for this, is that
uh we usually think about carbonand uh carbon as it involves
climate change and other otherthings that are happening around
us as the number one source ofuh carbon.
But there's more carbon storedwithin the soil than there is in
the atmosphere.
And so we and actually there wewe do a really good job of
(04:49):
talking about trees as ways toget carbon into the soil, but
actually perennials.
Prairie plants, prairie grasses,those kinds of things are an
even better way of gettingcarbon because they have so many
life cycles of those roots everyyear, they get more carbon into
the soil that way, and so it's areally cool thing.
Trees are great, and prairieplants are also really great.
(05:10):
Next question takes 4,000 yearsto build just one inch of
topsoil.
Takes 4,000 years to build justone inch of topsoil.
All right, must be true.
A couple of the guesses come inhere.
Maybe they're not guesses, maybeyou guys are just that smart.
Um has no idea.
(05:30):
So yeah, this uh one.
I also heard prairie plantsstore so much carbon in the
roots.
Yep, exactly.
That is 100% true, Grady.
This one is it takes 4,000 yearsto build just one inch of
topsoil is false.
And I don't know if that wastricky or not, but it takes
1,000 years to build an inch oftopsoil, and so that's still a
(05:52):
pretty uh incredible number onits own.
So it takes between 750 and1,000 years to build one inch of
topsoil.
Um and I this question uh iskind of a personal thorn in my
side.
One of the reasons why I uh justhated my agronomy class is that
(06:12):
in I have a degree inhorticulture from Iowa State,
and so I have horticulture anddesign and took an agronomy
class.
And so agronomy is the study ofsoils, and it was solely the
study of soils for row crops.
I was state university, butstill it was obnoxious and it
still pissed me off because Ivery much didn't want to be a
farm kid just doing, you know,row crops and planting corn and
(06:35):
soybeans and stuff.
And so with that, they talkedabout organic matter and how
growing up we had always doneno-till, and we so we left the
corn stalks, left all the thingson top of the ground, and so
that would work its way down andbuild organic material over
time.
And the professor was saying howmuch of a waste that is and how
we're losing organic material,and there's nothing we can do
(06:57):
about it because of this thingright here is it takes a
thousand years to build an inchof topsoil.
And we have pretty much gottenrid of most all the topsoil
through all of our farms,through poor agronomic
processes.
We have gotten definitely rid ofalmost all of our topsoil in our
landscapes and urban areas.
Anytime a new house gets built,they pull that topsoil all out
(07:18):
and you just get the junk that'sleft over.
But our professor was saying youshould always take all those
things off to use them for otherthings because it takes over a
hundred years to increase by onepercent the amount of organic
material in the soil.
And it was just such ashort-sided myopic horizon, it
just pissed me off.
And so that's a long time laterbecause I'm not that young
(07:40):
anymore, and uh still pisses meoff to this day.
Um, all right, true or false.
Next question soil can die, andI should have put die in air
quotes when treated poorly,meaning that all the all the
microbes, all the bacteria, allthe friends that are in there
can absolutely die if it istreated poorly.
And uh this question I don'tlove, so I'll just kind of skip
(08:01):
through it.
Uh it's true, absolutely true.
We can uh kill off our soil ifwe don't treat it well.
And then last question uh is agood one.
Uh healthy soils, livingorganisms make up 10% of the
soil by volume.
Healthy soils, living organismsmake up 10% of the soil by
volume.
What uh what do you think thatone is?
True or false?
(08:21):
Guessing false, is it more?
Who else has guesses?
Anybody?
5% false.
The answer is false, correct.
Healthy soils, living organismsonly make up 1% of the volume of
soil.
And it made sure to make to say1% of the volume, because uh
even though there is so many,are so many things happening in
(08:43):
the soil, by volume, uh the soilis still mostly organic
material, which is usuallydecomposing organic material, it
is things like rocks, soil,sand, silt.
We'll get to those kinds ofthings later on here today.
But even though it is socritical in getting keeping our
landscapes healthy and safe andmoving, there aren't that much
(09:06):
by volume in there that aregrowing.
So this is what the profile ofsoil looks like.
And soil, as you think aboutgeographic, geologic entities
and how everything has layersand layers and layers.
Soil is the same way.
Soil has its own layers, and soit starts out at the top with
organic layers, and so that isthe real growth points of where
(09:29):
all the plants are growing from.
And then we also have thetopsoil, and the organic layer
and the topsoil together are theuh it's called the rhizosphere.
I'll write that in here for youbecause I didn't write it down
on the nerd points for anybodyon that one today.
But uh the rhizosphere is thetop layers of the soil where all
(09:50):
the action happens.
That's where most of the livingmaterials are, that's where most
of the um roots and decomposingroots and all those things are
all held generally in that toporganic layer.
And so you have the organiclayer and then the top soil,
sorry, in that top rhizospherelayer where all the growth is
happening.
Then below that, you have thesubsoil, which is kind of a mix
(10:10):
of the two things.
And so the subsoil is whathappens there is it stores a lot
of moisture.
And so it generally has largerpores, it has larger areas where
moisture gets stored.
And so when the roots getaccessed, that through the
subsoil, and then it canpercolate up through the top.
And then the parent material andthe bedrock are the bottom
(10:30):
couple of layers.
And so these layers can varywildly depending on where you're
at.
So, like solid ancient prairiegrass areas in the Midwest, they
can have three to five feet oftopsoil, but then you go to, you
know, western South Dakota, andthere's no topsoil.
It's just subsoil, a little bitof organic layer, and then
(10:53):
parent material and bedrock downthere.
And so it all depends on whereyou're at and what's going on,
the different layers of soil.
And so with this, you also wantto make sure that you're
understanding the living beingsthat are in our soil also live
in layers.
And so that organic layer on tophas lots of insects that live in
there, a lot of differentearthworms and those kinds of
(11:14):
things live in that organiclayer.
And then the topsoil and subsoillayer, the same things kind of
happen.
And so you have uh topsoillayer, you just have billions
and bazillions of nematodes andbacteria.
And the most important one we'regonna talk about today is fungi.
And we're gonna make sure I'm onthe right spot.
(11:34):
Yeah, we're gonna pull out ofhere for just a moment.
I move I rearranged my office,so I've got uh whiteboard.
So if I end up talking to thewhiteboard and not to the
microphone, make sure tovirtually kick me and just let
me know if you can't hear me.
Um, but first thing we're gonnatalk about is the Fs framework.
So EFSS.
And so that is eliminatechemicals, feed pollinators,
(11:57):
save water, store carbon.
And so soil, healthy soil doesall four of those things.
And so anytime you usechemicals, that pills things
that are living in the soil.
So if you are using a pesticide,that's killing the bacteria and
the fungus and the lichens andthose kinds of things that are
living in our soils.
(12:17):
So you want to make sure not touse those at all.
So our goal here at MinnesotaGardening is to eliminate as
many chemicals and completelyeliminate, if we can, those
chemicals in our landscapes.
Same thing goes for fertilizer,uh, especially petroleum-based
fertilizers.
It happens some with organicfertilizers as well.
Actually, I'll take that back.
It definitely impacts negativelythe soil health using organic
(12:41):
fertilizers in general.
It is uh, we want to get awayfrom it as much as we possibly
can.
So we want to eliminate thosechemicals.
And then for feedingpollinators, having healthy soil
makes the plants grow a lotbetter.
So that's there.
Having these soil layers, italso cleans our water as it goes
down into the aquifers, and sothat we're saving water and then
storing carbon.
So, as we talked about, thatcarbon sink that happens in the
(13:03):
soil by pulling carbon out ofthe atmosphere down into the
ground, and it makes it so we'remitigating climate change and
doing a lot of good thingsthere.
And so we are great asked aboutthe whiteboard.
I don't know if uh I'll makesure to say what it is.
I don't know what's uh happeningwith that, if it's trying to
focus on me or something, buthopefully uh we'll see.
(13:24):
So I'll try and stay out of theway for the moment.
Uh, so F's.
So the F's framework is where westart here at Minnesota
Gardening.
And uh, we've already talkedabout the 1% living, and so
there's a lot of living materialthat's really small, tiny guys.
And so we need to make sure andthat those are extremely,
extremely sensitive to chemicalchanges and to water
(13:46):
availability and those kinds ofthings.
So we need to make sure thatwe're taking care of those
things and protecting our soilsas they are a living,
functioning being here for us.
Fungus is the next one.
So, fungus is the thing that Ifind to be just endlessly
fascinating as it comes tolandscape.
And so we are learning more andmore and more over by day, it
(14:06):
seems really that new researchgets released as to the
interconnectivity of fungus andplants, how they have evolved
and grown to really, really relyon each other.
And I'm gonna pull up a coupleslides here to kind of show how
that is.
We're gonna start down here.
Fungus, this is kind of a jankyslide, but it was one of the
(14:28):
best uh I could find forillustrating this case.
Basically, what the fungus does,one of the things that the
fungus does in the ground is itacts as an extension of the root
system.
So a plant can have its rootsystem that lives in one spot.
Plants can't move, they can't uhthey can grow toward water, but
they can't pick up and move tosomeplace else.
(14:48):
But what they can do is enlistthe assistance of other things.
And so how they've evolved isthat fungus has grown to work
with the root system of plantsand help them out and deliver
what they need to get delivered.
So if a pocket of, you know,calcium is over here, but the
(15:09):
root system is over here, themycelium and the fungus will
bridge that gap.
And so they will create apathway for bringing the giving
access, not via root, but theywill give access to the calcium
over here to this root that ishere and let them share and go
back and forth.
So mycelium, so the the I'll getto that in just a second, the
(15:30):
the uh string-like bodies thatare part of a fungus, a
mushroom, are 700% larger thanthe root system of a plant.
So they can uh give a 700ximpact for accessing water,
nutrients, materials, everythingthat they can uh through the
soil to those plants who areunable to move.
(15:53):
And so fungi will move for theseplants in order to access the
things that they want.
And so they do that by this, Ithink is just endlessly
fascinating again.
So hopefully you guys are nottoo annoyed with my nerding out
on this today.
But uh, as you look here, theselarger tube-like structures are
the roots, and so those are theroots that are growing through a
(16:16):
substrate, and these littlestrings that are through here
are the hyphae, which are thefruiting body basically of a uh
of a mushroom.
And when you see a mushroom ontop of the soil, you see that
one fruiting body of themushroom.
And so that has the spores thatgo out into nature so they can
make more fungi uh throughout.
(16:37):
That's its reproductive process.
But underneath of the soil,there are these mycelium,
hyphae, um, all sorts ofdifferent structures underground
that are delivering that aremoving materials back and forth.
And so it's just tubes basicallyunder a ground.
And so this shows how thehyphae, so the really small
(17:00):
tube-like pieces on the fungi,they grow into a root.
And so the plants allow them togrow into a root system to
directly deliver and pump inthings for the plant.
And so this isn't a one-way uhthing either.
The mycelium and the the fungiwill deliver nutrients and
(17:22):
things to a plant, but the plantwill also, uh, it's been uh
proven recently that the plantwill uh of all of the sugars
that it makes forphotosynthesis, it delivers 40%
of those sugars into the soil tothese fungi, which I think is
just really, really crazy.
And so this is a slide of thosethings.
(17:43):
So these are two little pinetrees, seedlings that are
growing as well.
It's also been recently proventhat the seeds carry spores for
pre-inoculating the soil wherethose plants are going to grow.
So, like these fungi came withthe seeds for these pine trees,
which is just incredible to me.
So you can see how they startedgrowing, and they are part of
(18:06):
the reason why plants can besuccessful is because they get
access, these mycelium that growa lot faster than the roots and
the root hairs do.
And so they grow out and theyare able to access nutrients,
they're able to access water andthey're able to do all these
cool things way before a planthas the root system and the and
the growth there to be able todo that on its own.
So it helps them succeed andthrive.
(18:27):
And then it also you can see inthis photo that the two
seedlings are connected via themycelium from the fungus.
And so I think it's uh a supercool thing that happens.
And if you take and think aboutfrom there, like what the
impacts are.
So when we are growing food, forexample, and you're starting
seeds in the spring for tomatoesand whatnot, we grow our plants
(18:51):
in sterile soil.
We grow our stare our seeds aresterilized.
So we make sure that that has alot of chemicals and fungi uh
and fungicide and all thosethings that are on those plants,
and a lot of them comepre-inoculated with those
chemicals on them.
And so from there, we're growingall these things in a completely
(19:12):
sterile environment, and theydon't have the assistance of
these fungi in order to makethese connections, in order to
talk and communicate back andforth.
And so it's it's reallyinteresting to me as we go
forward how much we're gonnalearn about what the natural
habitat is for these plants andfor seeds and for seedlings and
(19:32):
their ability to survive andthrive.
And so it's also been shown,which I think is really
interesting as well, is thatthere are the way we do
landscape now, is we've got aplant and then a whole bunch of
space and another plant becauseGod forbid the two trees were
touching or anything like that.
And uh you think about theforest, and those are touching
and they're close enough wherethe roots are are commingling
(19:53):
and things, and so there is alot happening between those
roots and the mycelium and thefungus and the different uh
transportation bodiesunderground that it's really
important that those trees beclose together so they can
communicate and so they send uhdifferent signals back and forth
between the trees through themycelium.
So it's I'll I'll stop with itfrom there.
(20:16):
But just this living undergroundmechanism that we are just
learning about has such hugepotential for where things go
and what what happens into thefuture.
So I'm really, really excitedabout that as it goes.
So we already talked again.
Anyone has questions, if youdon't want to just hear me
spouting off about things, makesure to put them in the chat or
(20:37):
I can uh or just ask and I'll uhopen it up so you can ask
questions and go from there.
So we talked about soilstructures, so you know that
soil structures are reallyimportant to maintain those
structures.
One thing I didn't talk about iswater, and so water has to be
able to flow from the surfaceand down when it's wet out, and
(20:58):
when we get we're getting rainso that it can fill that subsoil
moisture back up.
But then also the soil water hasto be able to flow up.
So when it gets dry out, we needthese plants to be able to
access that water mechanism, andso it needs to be able to go
from the subsoil up in back intothe topsoil as the topsoil draws
out, dries out, and the plantsdraw the water into the
(21:19):
atmosphere as they are movingchemicals and nutrients up and
down their trunks and theirstems.
And so, with that, it is reallyimportant to recognize in soils
that water has a very difficulttime going from one texture to
another texture.
So let's say this is a reallysandy soil right here, and this
is a really clay soil down here.
(21:41):
If you are watering and it'sraining from the top, this
really sandy, loamy, healthysoil will uh come down and it
won't be able to go through.
It's called a soil interface.
It won't be able to go throughinto that clay.
It's just the way water flowsand the way water works.
And so it will all pool abovethat clay area in your
(22:02):
landscape.
And so they used to do a lot ofuh encouraging you to add
organic material and do a lot ofthings to improve the soil, like
right around when you'replanting a tree or right around
when you're planting a shrub toput a bunch of compost in with
that plant.
Um and that ends up being reallydangerous because what happens
(22:22):
is the water is unable to getthrough through those different
that creates an interface, andso the water is unable to get
through and penetrate thatnative soil.
So what's already there is whatthe plant has.
And so it uh you have a holewhere you dug for the tree, and
it ends up filling that holewith water.
And then what happens is thoseroots end up circling where the
(22:43):
water is, and the roots can'tget through into the clay
either.
And so uh you want to make surewhen you are planting plants, we
don't follow the same oldinformation that we should be
adding all these amendments anddifferent types of all these
amendments and different typesof organic materials and things
into the soil around the plant.
We want to make sure that thatis as close to the native soil
(23:06):
as it possibly can be.
So you can loosen it up, you canmake sure, but it's still gonna
be the same kind of thing andthe water will still be able to
go through it.
So you want to make sure not tobe able not to be creating those
interfaces.
And so there are very few timeswhen we recommend amending the
soil through any landscapeprocesses now, not even for
perennials, because what happensis we want to make sure that the
(23:29):
plants that are there are onesthat can thrive.
If you have super needy thingsthat you really want to grow, a
Japanese maple or a rose of somesort, then absolutely you'll
need to amend the soil and dothat kind of stuff.
But if you're planting a prairiegarden in your backyard, then
you want to use that existingsoil in that area and you don't
want to amend it with a lot ofdifferent things.
(23:50):
So now you can add fertility bydoing compost on the top, which
we'll talk about in a coupleweeks here for the uh Minnesota
gardening members in the weeklylessons.
And so we'll have that piecethere that we'll talk about as
ways we can improve fertility onthings, but underground and in
the soil, we want to mostlyleave it alone and just leave
everybody there at the sametime.
(24:10):
So that's uh water interface isa big thing to think about.
Next one on the list is carbonstorage, and so all these things
are really critical for storingcarbon underground.
So we need to keep moving asmuch of that carbon.
Now, we as you know individualhomeowners cannot impact enough
to change what's happening inthe the greater world, but we
(24:33):
can make a difference if we allpool our resources and do these
things together.
So this is uh Doug Palamy's bigvision for homegrown national
parks.
And so by having enoughhomeowners pooling together and
getting more carbon sunk intotheir into their soil at their
own houses, through trees,through prairie plants, those
kinds of things.
It's really important that wehave that and continue in that
(24:55):
mindset that we are workingtogether to help with these
things.
All right, so now kind of thenuts and bolts of uh things.
We have landscape wellness.
And so we have hopefully you allhave taken it, but if you
haven't yet, you can go to themain menu at
MinnesotaGardening.com and youare able to go in that main menu
and uh take a landscape wellnessquiz.
(25:17):
And so that landscape wellnessquiz gives you a spectrum as to
where we're at on the the healthof your landscape.
And so we want to take folks whoare going from just a very
standard suburban chemical, alllawn, just few plants, uses a
lot of chemicals, uses a lot ofwater to keep that lawn moving.
(25:37):
And uh, we want to make surethat we're going from that to a
thriving, healthy landscape.
And along the way, we've got adetox uh stage, we've got a
nourishing stage, we've got athriving stage is where we want
to get to for thriving, healthylandscapes.
And so that's what we're doingat Minnesota Gardening is
helping people move through thatcontinuum so that we are able to
help reduce the rates of cancer,helping to making sure that we
(26:01):
are saving and feedingpollinators and songbirds,
making sure that we are savingwater and we're doing really
cool things like that, which wecan only do together.
And so it's a good thing.
Mulch is a really importantpiece of this soils concept.
If you think about a prairie, itis completely covered with
plants, and there's no ingeneral, unless you've got a
gopher, there's in general nosoil exposed.
(26:23):
And so all that soil isunderneath of the plant stems
and leaves and old decomposingplant parts from the previous
years.
And so uh it's really importantto emulate that as much as we
possibly can.
And so there's a stupid termcalled green mulch, and uh, I
hate it with a passion, butthat's what it's known as, and
(26:44):
so I'm I'm a follower, I guess,and so we'll uh continue to
follow on the green mulch uh uhtrack here.
But what it is is we want tomake sure that we are using
plants as protection for soil,and so that raindrops cause a
tremendous, shocking amount ofdamage to soil and soil
structure with erosion, andthat's I mean, that's just what
(27:06):
they do.
So we have these landscapes nowthat are a plant with a lot of
mulch, hardwood mulch inbetween, and then another plant
on the other side.
And um, we want to make surethat that whole thing gets
filled up with plants becausemulch is even worse than having
lawn in areas for what itprovides for local ecosystems.
They don't provide anything forit, takes a lot of chemicals to
(27:28):
keep all the weeds out of there.
It takes a lot of water becauseit is generally in an irrigation
system, it doesn't provide anyfood for pollinators or
songbirds or any habitatwhatsoever.
And so we want to make sure thatwe're having as many plants in
there.
And so that's where the stupidgreen mulch term comes from, but
it is what it is.
So we're gonna go with it.
So we want to have green mulchwherever we are in our landscape
(27:51):
beds, and so it's having as manylandscape beds as we can to do
those four things.
Next one is eliminate, uh, stopusing chemicals, stop using
fertilizer wherever you can.
We have a small fertilizerrecommendation for the fall, uh,
which is purely mostly nitrogenfor plant health, and so that we
don't have erosion happening inour lawns.
If our lawns aren't taken careof, they will erode, and so then
(28:13):
we have phosphorus and we havealgae blooms and we have all
these bad things that happen.
So we want to level this playingfield out a little bit and make
sure that uh we are not having aton of erosion.
And so we recommend a half apound of nitrogen per thousand
square feet for our turf in thefall.
Next one is kind of a quandaryfor everyone is no till.
And so a lot of people have aproblem with this one, but we
(28:33):
want to, in order to maintainthose fungal networks that
happen underground, we arelearning more and more every day
that we don't want to dig.
We want to leave those alonebecause every time you stick a
shovel in the ground, uh, itbreaks up those networks and it
breaks up those tubes that areunderground and those uh
connections between the plantsand between the my the different
(28:55):
fungi and different things thatare living underground, um, it
breaks those all up.
And so we highly recommend nottilling and not digging any
holes unless you absolutely haveto for things.
And so there are weeding thathas to get done, there are other
things that have to get done.
But if you are uh building a newbed, don't till it all up.
(29:15):
Again, unless you have to.
There's obviously reasons fordoing that, that kind of thing.
If you have uh food garden beds,you want to promote as many of
those fungi underground as youpossibly can.
So if you have a uh tomato uhthat is growing in the ground
this fall or next spring,whenever you clean up, you just
want to cut that right here, andthen you leave this section
(29:37):
underground.
And so you will uh it'lldecompose quickly, you'll just
plant around it and everythingwill be great.
So leave that there in order tohave all those root systems and
all that things decomposeunderground.
That adds organic material tothe soil, but it also doesn't
cut up the um uh myceliumnetwork, fungal network
underground.
(29:57):
All right, last one for today.
Is organic materials.
So it kind of goes with what Ijust talked about.
And the importance of organicmaterials in our soil is
critical.
And so as you think about, as Iwas talking about western South
Dakota, and as you think aboutthe badlands and the soils out
there, there's no topsoil.
It's just bedrock and substrate.
(30:19):
There's no actual or very littleactual soil that is there on the
ground.
But you get just, you know, acouple hundred miles east of
there.
And uh there is lots of soil.
And so it just depends on whatis going on.
And uh the key differencebetween those two things is
organic material.
So organic material holds thatsoil together, it promotes the
(30:42):
fungal networks, it helps toprovide micronutrients, some
macronutrients, and it helps tokeep all of that soil together.
And so I'm almost done here.
So if you guys have questions,if you have things you want me
to expand on more or talk adnauseum about at you a little
bit more, make sure to add theminto the chat and I will uh
start to answer those questionsas we go uh go through here.
(31:03):
But uh that organic material inthe soil is the number one
differentiator between healthysoils and non-healthy soils.
And so that organic material isalso the fungal networks.
Those are organic materials,those are bacteria that are in
there, and there's just a lot ofdifferent things that really,
really promote organic lifecycles in the soil.
(31:25):
And so you've got if you thinkabout how the roots grow, the
roots grow down into the soiland they die back.
And so then you've got all thesenew pathways for water and for
air to access deeper into thesoil and keep moving that way.
And so that organic material inthe soil is the number one
differentiator.
So you just know, you can smell,you can see that uh dark, rich
(31:46):
soil that's high in organicmatter and just is a wonderful,
wonderful thing to have, whichis why we want to make sure that
we are leaving the leaves.
And so we talked last monthabout leaving the leaves and
making sure that we are haleaving those leaves on top of
the soil so they decompose andthey continue to uh release
nutrients into the ground thatthose plants need.
And so it's uh really, reallygood things that way.
(32:08):
So that is the end of mywhiteboard and of my uh let me
make sure here.
Oh, I've got one more thing.
I just want to make sure thateveryone knows.
Um, right now, here we go.
Um, right now at MinnesotaGardening, there we go, we are
having an October membershipdrive.
And so I want by the end ofOctober to have a hundred
(32:32):
members.
We have like 40 members rightnow, but I want to have a
hundred members by the end ofOctober.
That will between the hundred ofour members, we will literally
save thousands of chemicals fromgoing out on the ground.
We will literally feed millionsof insects and songbirds, and we
(32:52):
will literally save millionsmore gallons of water and save
fresh water.
And so the goal here is toreally collectively work
together and get some thingsdone.
So we're having the Octobermembership drive.
So if you uh aren't a member,please think about joining.
Um, if you are a member, you canabsolutely switch to an annual
membership if you would like ata really cheap rate, but also
(33:16):
make sure to invite friends.
If you have anybody that youknow that would be interested in
being a member of MinnesotaGardening, you can uh invite
them here.
And so we the annual membershipends tomorrow.
We've had it open all this uhpast week at$127.
Sorry, I should say$197.
Annual membership for$197.
(33:36):
Sorry about that, ends tomorrow.
So the end of the day tomorrow,it's the last day to get our
annual membership for$197.
And we've got uh a bunch of newmembers who have come in, and
I'm really, really excited.
It's 56% saving over our monthlymembership of$37 a month.
And so we just want to get asmany people in for the October
membership as we possibly can.
(33:58):
So there's a lot of cool thingsover at Minnesota Gardening, and
please become a member becausethat's how we keep this action
going.
So again,$197 for a month, justgo to MinnesotaGardening.com and
I'll actually add it on here foryou.
And you'll also get an emailhere in 20 minutes or so that
will that will give it to you aswell.
(34:20):
But here's the link if anybodywants to uh join with an annual
membership.
So that's there.
All right, so now I actually getto the questions.
So if you have questions aswell, I'll make sure to add
them.
So Katie says regarding thetomato example and not pulling
plants out, do you leave the cutplant matter on your vegetable
garden beds?
When do you cut them off at thedirt level or do you clear it
out?
So it depends on the plants.
(34:40):
Tomatoes are super umsusceptible to a lot of
different blights and fungus andall sorts of all sorts of
problems.
And so tomatoes I always remove,not always, I generally remove
tomatoes in the fall.
And so just cut those off atsoil level to get the leaves out
of there because the leaves arewhat generally carry all of the
blight types of problems thattomatoes have.
(35:03):
And anybody in the tomatofamily, so tomatoes, potatoes,
eggplant, peppers, those kindsof things, you want to rotate
those, and so you want to nothave them be in the same spot
for more than two, three yearsat the most, and move them to a
different spot after that.
And so, um, so you want torotate those because they are
really susceptible to soil-borneissues, and so I cut them off at
(35:27):
soil level.
Everything else below that isfine, it's not a problem
whatsoever.
And then I toss that all of myflowers, all those other things,
beans, like all those kinds offriends, I leave those all
winter long.
I do not uh clean those up, Ijust let them be, and they
mostly decompose over thewinter.
And uh, if they're a problem,then I cut them back and move
them around in the in thespring.
(35:47):
But most of them are all okay,and they're a cover crop
basically for the winter, andthey work really well that way.
So uh that's how I handle thosein the vegetable flower food
garden type situation.
Liz, annual flowers, I leavemost of those.
I don't cut back, but I I alsodon't care about messy.
If you're somebody who really,either yourself or a partner, is
(36:09):
worried about being tidy all thetime, then maybe that is
something you want to clean up.
But if you have beds that are uhnot going to be seen by anyone
or anything like that, or youdon't care about, then
absolutely leave those.
Um there's zero reason.
Those things can all go backinto they'll decompose, they'll
add nutrients back into theground, and they'll be in good
shape.
Like if you leave cosmos,they'll reseed for you and you
(36:32):
don't uh and you don't need toever plant new cosmos.
So that's the benefit of leavingthose things.
That picture of the tithoniathat I uh put uh in earlier in
the share part.
That Mexican sunflower is avolunteer.
It grew from seed, where theseeds where I planted, not a
single one of those grew.
And so uh I was really happybecause they didn't start to get
(36:54):
big until July, August, thatkind of thing was when they
finally started growing, and itwas pretty cool to see.
Is the rotation locations advicetrue for just tomatoes, or
should we be rotating throughthe raised bed rolls for
everything?
Tomatoes are the number onething, and uh, if you are um
yeah, tomatoes, so anything inthat family that tomatoes are
(37:16):
in, so there's tomatoes,peppers, eggplant, and potatoes,
those are all in the samefamily, and they're all
susceptible to a variety of uhblights, leaf blights generally.
So as you grow your tomatoes,you those those bottom leaves,
they all tend to eventually getgnarly and brown up and and that
(37:36):
kind of thing.
And you can have a lot more itgrows up the stem.
Those are all soil-bornepathogens that are from
splashing, and so it canabsolutely happen.
I don't have too much of aproblem with it at my house.
My mom, she has a huge problemwith it on the farm, and so it's
it's different for everybody.
Um, like I can't, I also have ahuge, huge problem with powdery
(37:59):
mildew.
No matter how much I try, Icannot grow any cucumbers at my
house because I have a hugepowdery mildew issue where
powdery mildew is just here, andso I can't grow tomato, I can't
grow cucumbers.
My peonies get it really bad.
Um, so it's that kind of thing.
So it all depends on yourlocation and what your
experience has been.
(38:20):
If you haven't had a problemwith it and you've been growing
tomatoes there for 10 years,then uh it's not a huge issue
for you, and I wouldn't worryabout it.
Um, but if you do see thingsstart to degrade, move to a
different bed and uh do it, doit differently there.
I hope that answers thequestion.
It wasn't too long-winded onthings.
Um time for a couple morequestions if anybody's got them.
(38:46):
Um I just want to appreciate andsay thanks again to the folks
who uh haven't been here before,who have uh joined, and folks
who haven't who have come towith us today.
So Ellen and Katie, thank youvery much, Katie, for being a
new member.
Robert, Liz, Katie, the otherKatie.
Um, Grady is always great tohave you all here.
I just really, really appreciateeveryone's support.
(39:07):
Please share with your friendsand happy to be here.
So the rest of this month, ourweekly lessons, we have compost
and mulch next week.
We have macronutrients,nitrogen, potassium, and
phosphorus the following week,and then macro new uh
micronutrients and organicmaterial the last week of uh the
and uh then we go into landscapewellness from there, which is
(39:29):
going to be a combination inNovember of reflection and goal
setting and making sure that weare headed the right direction
all together and what we can do.
So that's the month of Novembercoming up, and uh just really
appreciate everybody being here.
So thanks again, all I reallyappreciate it, and uh, I will
see you again soon.
(39:51):
So I will post this tomorrow.
The video will be available forall of our members and the
membership side, and I'll alsopost the audio as a podcast
that'll come up uh tomorrow orthe next day, so that uh we'll
be at the Minnesota Gardeningpodcast that everyone can listen
to.
So thanks all.
Have a wonderful, wonderfulnight.
Uh on behalf of my family, I'mglad that the the internet held
(40:13):
strong for the night.
So we'll be good there.
So hey, September masterclass,yeah, it's posted.
I'll find it and I'll tag you onit.
So we'll we'll roll with that,and I'll make sure that I
actually posted it.
That's the other piece.
So we'll I'll tag you there nomatter what.
So, all right, everybody, thanksfor being awesome, and I'll talk
to you again soon.
See what I mean?
I hope you enjoyed it.
Yesterday, and so I just againwant to invite you that you can
(40:38):
go back to 100 and just so youknow what our goal is with a
hundred members of MiddleGarden.
With 100 members, we will beable over 10 years to eliminate
7,500,000.
Today is a special day.
(01:10):
So much number.
So we'd love to have you won 100meters at the end of October.
And we are making our way to ouropen 2020.
And now we have a October 2023and October.
(01:35):
October masterclass.
Each month we have a food, andthis month food and October is
healthy soil.
And this masterclass is allabout the healthy, thriving
soils that we have under ourfeet.
We're going to start out with alittle quiz.
And so I don't know, you're notreally required to use the
comments on this, but I wouldlike you to like shout out an
(01:57):
answer.
And the only way I can hear itis if you use comments.
So this is a true or false quizabout healthy living soils.
And so I'll give this a littlepreface on the fact that a lot
of people don't think aboutsoils as living.
A lot of people don't thinkabout soils as needing to be
healthy.
Soil is just there.
We walk on it, we grow things init.
(02:18):
We don't really need to do muchabout it, but there's so much
more going on in soil.
And there's so much morehappening, and it's really,
really critical for what we needto do to build healthy
landscapes.
And so I'm really happy that aswe're doing our weekly lessons
with members, that that issomething that the starting
place and the baseline for wherewe are going with things.
(02:39):
So with healthy living soils,it's really important to
recognize that there is so muchhappening under the soil.
And the more that we mess withsoil and the more that we use
chemicals on soil, and the morethat we try and control it, the
less healthy it becomes.
And so uh here are a couple justtrue and false questions here.
(03:00):
Statements is a better way tosay that, for soil.
So, true or false, onetablespoon of soil contains more
organisms than there are humanson the entire planet Earth.
So one tablespoon of soilcontains more organisms than
there are humans on the entireEarth.
Is that true or false?
Any guesses?
Thanks, Katie.
(03:21):
True.
Any others?
Liz goes for a true as well.
You guys are correct.
It is true.
There are uh way, way, way moreorganisms in just a tablespoon
of soil than there are humans onEarth.
And so I think that was a reallyinteresting place to start with
this because it's reallycritical to understand that all
(03:41):
those within your soil, thereare microbes, there are
nematodes, there are bacteria,there are viruses that are in
there.
There are lots of things thatare extremely healthy to our
ecosystem as it has evolved overtime.
And a few things that areunhealthy, for sure, for humans
and for other things, but thevast majority of it are all
good, healthy things.
Next question (04:02):
There is more carbon stored in the soil than
there is carbon stored in theatmosphere.
True or false?
There is more carbon stored inthe soil than there is carbon
stored in the atmosphere.
Look at you guys getting thehang of it.
I love all this.
Beautiful, beautiful, true,true, true.
Yep, all true.
Uh yeah, there is and this one Ithought was really fascinating
(04:27):
when I found this statistic as Iwas preparing for this, is that
uh we usually think about carbonand uh carbon as it involves
climate change and other otherthings that are happening around
us as the number one source ofuh carbon.
But there's more carbon storedwithin the soil than there is in
the atmosphere.
And so we and actually there wewe do a really good job of
(04:49):
talking about trees as ways toget carbon into the soil, but
actually perennials.
Prairie plants, prairie grasses,those kinds of things are an
even better way of gettingcarbon because they have so many
life cycles of those roots everyyear, they get more carbon into
the soil that way, and so it's areally cool thing.
Trees are great, and prairieplants are also really great.
(05:10):
Next question takes 4,000 yearsto build just one inch of
topsoil.
Takes 4,000 years to build justone inch of topsoil.
All right, must be true.
A couple of the guesses come inhere.
Maybe they're not guesses, maybeyou guys are just that smart.
Um has no idea.
(05:30):
So yeah, this uh one.
I also heard prairie plantsstore so much carbon in the
roots.
Yep, exactly.
That is 100% true, Grady.
This one is it takes 4,000 yearsto build just one inch of
topsoil is false.
And I don't know if that wastricky or not, but it takes
1,000 years to build an inch oftopsoil, and so that's still a
(05:52):
pretty uh incredible number onits own.
So it takes between 750 and1,000 years to build one inch of
topsoil.
Um and I this question uh iskind of a personal thorn in my
side.
One of the reasons why I uh justhated my agronomy class is that
(06:12):
in I have a degree inhorticulture from Iowa State,
and so I have horticulture anddesign and took an agronomy
class.
And so agronomy is the study ofsoils, and it was solely the
study of soils for row crops.
I was state university, butstill it was obnoxious and it
still pissed me off because Ivery much didn't want to be a
farm kid just doing, you know,row crops and planting corn and
(06:35):
soybeans and stuff.
And so with that, they talkedabout organic matter and how
growing up we had always doneno-till, and we so we left the
corn stalks, left all the thingson top of the ground, and so
that would work its way down andbuild organic material over
time.
And the professor was saying howmuch of a waste that is and how
we're losing organic material,and there's nothing we can do
(06:57):
about it because of this thingright here is it takes a
thousand years to build an inchof topsoil.
And we have pretty much gottenrid of most all the topsoil
through all of our farms,through poor agronomic
processes.
We have gotten definitely rid ofalmost all of our topsoil in our
landscapes and urban areas.
Anytime a new house gets built,they pull that topsoil all out
(07:18):
and you just get the junk that'sleft over.
But our professor was saying youshould always take all those
things off to use them for otherthings because it takes over a
hundred years to increase by onepercent the amount of organic
material in the soil.
And it was just such ashort-sided myopic horizon, it
just pissed me off.
And so that's a long time laterbecause I'm not that young
(07:40):
anymore, and uh still pisses meoff to this day.
Um, all right, true or false.
Next question soil can die, andI should have put die in air
quotes when treated poorly,meaning that all the all the
microbes, all the bacteria, allthe friends that are in there
can absolutely die if it istreated poorly.
And uh this question I don'tlove, so I'll just kind of skip
(08:01):
through it.
Uh it's true, absolutely true.
We can uh kill off our soil ifwe don't treat it well.
And then last question uh is agood one.
Uh healthy soils, livingorganisms make up 10% of the
soil by volume.
Healthy soils, living organismsmake up 10% of the soil by
volume.
What uh what do you think thatone is?
True or false?
(08:21):
Guessing false, is it more?
Who else has guesses?
Anybody?
5% false.
The answer is false, correct.
Healthy soils, living organismsonly make up 1% of the volume of
soil.
And it made sure to make to say1% of the volume, because uh
even though there is so many,are so many things happening in
(08:43):
the soil, by volume, uh the soilis still mostly organic
material, which is usuallydecomposing organic material, it
is things like rocks, soil,sand, silt.
We'll get to those kinds ofthings later on here today.
But even though it is socritical in getting keeping our
landscapes healthy and safe andmoving, there aren't that much
(09:06):
by volume in there that aregrowing.
So this is what the profile ofsoil looks like.
And soil, as you think aboutgeographic, geologic entities
and how everything has layersand layers and layers.
Soil is the same way.
Soil has its own layers, and soit starts out at the top with
organic layers, and so that isthe real growth points of where
(09:29):
all the plants are growing from.
And then we also have thetopsoil, and the organic layer
and the topsoil together are theuh it's called the rhizosphere.
I'll write that in here for youbecause I didn't write it down
on the nerd points for anybodyon that one today.
But uh the rhizosphere is thetop layers of the soil where all
(09:50):
the action happens.
That's where most of the livingmaterials are, that's where most
of the um roots and decomposingroots and all those things are
all held generally in that toporganic layer.
And so you have the organiclayer and then the top soil,
sorry, in that top rhizospherelayer where all the growth is
happening.
Then below that, you have thesubsoil, which is kind of a mix
(10:10):
of the two things.
And so the subsoil is whathappens there is it stores a lot
of moisture.
And so it generally has largerpores, it has larger areas where
moisture gets stored.
And so when the roots getaccessed, that through the
subsoil, and then it canpercolate up through the top.
And then the parent material andthe bedrock are the bottom
(10:30):
couple of layers.
And so these layers can varywildly depending on where you're
at.
So, like solid ancient prairiegrass areas in the Midwest, they
can have three to five feet oftopsoil, but then you go to, you
know, western South Dakota, andthere's no topsoil.
It's just subsoil, a little bitof organic layer, and then
(10:53):
parent material and bedrock downthere.
And so it all depends on whereyou're at and what's going on,
the different layers of soil.
And so with this, you also wantto make sure that you're
understanding the living beingsthat are in our soil also live
in layers.
And so that organic layer on tophas lots of insects that live in
there, a lot of differentearthworms and those kinds of
(11:14):
things live in that organiclayer.
And then the topsoil and subsoillayer, the same things kind of
happen.
And so you have uh topsoillayer, you just have billions
and bazillions of nematodes andbacteria.
And the most important one we'regonna talk about today is fungi.
And we're gonna make sure I'm onthe right spot.
(11:34):
Yeah, we're gonna pull out ofhere for just a moment.
I move I rearranged my office,so I've got uh whiteboard.
So if I end up talking to thewhiteboard and not to the
microphone, make sure tovirtually kick me and just let
me know if you can't hear me.
Um, but first thing we're gonnatalk about is the Fs framework.
So EFSS.
And so that is eliminatechemicals, feed pollinators,
(11:57):
save water, store carbon.
And so soil, healthy soil doesall four of those things.
And so anytime you usechemicals, that pills things
that are living in the soil.
So if you are using a pesticide,that's killing the bacteria and
the fungus and the lichens andthose kinds of things that are
living in our soils.
(12:17):
So you want to make sure not touse those at all.
So our goal here at MinnesotaGardening is to eliminate as
many chemicals and completelyeliminate, if we can, those
chemicals in our landscapes.
Same thing goes for fertilizer,uh, especially petroleum-based
fertilizers.
It happens some with organicfertilizers as well.
Actually, I'll take that back.
It definitely impacts negativelythe soil health using organic
(12:41):
fertilizers in general.
It is uh, we want to get awayfrom it as much as we possibly
can.
So we want to eliminate thosechemicals.
And then for feedingpollinators, having healthy soil
makes the plants grow a lotbetter.
So that's there.
Having these soil layers, italso cleans our water as it goes
down into the aquifers, and sothat we're saving water and then
storing carbon.
So, as we talked about, thatcarbon sink that happens in the
(13:03):
soil by pulling carbon out ofthe atmosphere down into the
ground, and it makes it so we'remitigating climate change and
doing a lot of good thingsthere.
And so we are great asked aboutthe whiteboard.
I don't know if uh I'll makesure to say what it is.
I don't know what's uh happeningwith that, if it's trying to
focus on me or something, buthopefully uh we'll see.
(13:24):
So I'll try and stay out of theway for the moment.
Uh, so F's.
So the F's framework is where westart here at Minnesota
Gardening.
And uh, we've already talkedabout the 1% living, and so
there's a lot of living materialthat's really small, tiny guys.
And so we need to make sure andthat those are extremely,
extremely sensitive to chemicalchanges and to water
(13:46):
availability and those kinds ofthings.
So we need to make sure thatwe're taking care of those
things and protecting our soilsas they are a living,
functioning being here for us.
Fungus is the next one.
So, fungus is the thing that Ifind to be just endlessly
fascinating as it comes tolandscape.
And so we are learning more andmore and more over by day, it
(14:06):
seems really that new researchgets released as to the
interconnectivity of fungus andplants, how they have evolved
and grown to really, really relyon each other.
And I'm gonna pull up a coupleslides here to kind of show how
that is.
We're gonna start down here.
Fungus, this is kind of a jankyslide, but it was one of the
(14:28):
best uh I could find forillustrating this case.
Basically, what the fungus does,one of the things that the
fungus does in the ground is itacts as an extension of the root
system.
So a plant can have its rootsystem that lives in one spot.
Plants can't move, they can't uhthey can grow toward water, but
they can't pick up and move tosomeplace else.
(14:48):
But what they can do is enlistthe assistance of other things.
And so how they've evolved isthat fungus has grown to work
with the root system of plantsand help them out and deliver
what they need to get delivered.
So if a pocket of, you know,calcium is over here, but the
(15:09):
root system is over here, themycelium and the fungus will
bridge that gap.
And so they will create apathway for bringing the giving
access, not via root, but theywill give access to the calcium
over here to this root that ishere and let them share and go
back and forth.
So mycelium, so the the I'll getto that in just a second, the
(15:30):
the uh string-like bodies thatare part of a fungus, a
mushroom, are 700% larger thanthe root system of a plant.
So they can uh give a 700ximpact for accessing water,
nutrients, materials, everythingthat they can uh through the
soil to those plants who areunable to move.
(15:53):
And so fungi will move for theseplants in order to access the
things that they want.
And so they do that by this, Ithink is just endlessly
fascinating again.
So hopefully you guys are nottoo annoyed with my nerding out
on this today.
But uh, as you look here, theselarger tube-like structures are
the roots, and so those are theroots that are growing through a
(16:16):
substrate, and these littlestrings that are through here
are the hyphae, which are thefruiting body basically of a uh
of a mushroom.
And when you see a mushroom ontop of the soil, you see that
one fruiting body of themushroom.
And so that has the spores thatgo out into nature so they can
make more fungi uh throughout.
(16:37):
That's its reproductive process.
But underneath of the soil,there are these mycelium,
hyphae, um, all sorts ofdifferent structures underground
that are delivering that aremoving materials back and forth.
And so it's just tubes basicallyunder a ground.
And so this shows how thehyphae, so the really small
(17:00):
tube-like pieces on the fungi,they grow into a root.
And so the plants allow them togrow into a root system to
directly deliver and pump inthings for the plant.
And so this isn't a one-way uhthing either.
The mycelium and the the fungiwill deliver nutrients and
(17:22):
things to a plant, but the plantwill also, uh, it's been uh
proven recently that the plantwill uh of all of the sugars
that it makes forphotosynthesis, it delivers 40%
of those sugars into the soil tothese fungi, which I think is
just really, really crazy.
And so this is a slide of thosethings.
(17:43):
So these are two little pinetrees, seedlings that are
growing as well.
It's also been recently proventhat the seeds carry spores for
pre-inoculating the soil wherethose plants are going to grow.
So, like these fungi came withthe seeds for these pine trees,
which is just incredible to me.
So you can see how they startedgrowing, and they are part of
(18:06):
the reason why plants can besuccessful is because they get
access, these mycelium that growa lot faster than the roots and
the root hairs do.
And so they grow out and theyare able to access nutrients,
they're able to access water andthey're able to do all these
cool things way before a planthas the root system and the and
the growth there to be able todo that on its own.
So it helps them succeed andthrive.
(18:27):
And then it also you can see inthis photo that the two
seedlings are connected via themycelium from the fungus.
And so I think it's uh a supercool thing that happens.
And if you take and think aboutfrom there, like what the
impacts are.
So when we are growing food, forexample, and you're starting
seeds in the spring for tomatoesand whatnot, we grow our plants
(18:51):
in sterile soil.
We grow our stare our seeds aresterilized.
So we make sure that that has alot of chemicals and fungi uh
and fungicide and all thosethings that are on those plants,
and a lot of them comepre-inoculated with those
chemicals on them.
And so from there, we're growingall these things in a completely
(19:12):
sterile environment, and theydon't have the assistance of
these fungi in order to makethese connections, in order to
talk and communicate back andforth.
And so it's it's reallyinteresting to me as we go
forward how much we're gonnalearn about what the natural
habitat is for these plants andfor seeds and for seedlings and
(19:32):
their ability to survive andthrive.
And so it's also been shown,which I think is really
interesting as well, is thatthere are the way we do
landscape now, is we've got aplant and then a whole bunch of
space and another plant becauseGod forbid the two trees were
touching or anything like that.
And uh you think about theforest, and those are touching
and they're close enough wherethe roots are are commingling
(19:53):
and things, and so there is alot happening between those
roots and the mycelium and thefungus and the different uh
transportation bodiesunderground that it's really
important that those trees beclose together so they can
communicate and so they send uhdifferent signals back and forth
between the trees through themycelium.
So it's I'll I'll stop with itfrom there.
(20:16):
But just this living undergroundmechanism that we are just
learning about has such hugepotential for where things go
and what what happens into thefuture.
So I'm really, really excitedabout that as it goes.
So we already talked again.
Anyone has questions, if youdon't want to just hear me
spouting off about things, makesure to put them in the chat or
(20:37):
I can uh or just ask and I'll uhopen it up so you can ask
questions and go from there.
So we talked about soilstructures, so you know that
soil structures are reallyimportant to maintain those
structures.
One thing I didn't talk about iswater, and so water has to be
able to flow from the surfaceand down when it's wet out, and
(20:58):
when we get we're getting rainso that it can fill that subsoil
moisture back up.
But then also the soil water hasto be able to flow up.
So when it gets dry out, we needthese plants to be able to
access that water mechanism, andso it needs to be able to go
from the subsoil up in back intothe topsoil as the topsoil draws
out, dries out, and the plantsdraw the water into the
(21:19):
atmosphere as they are movingchemicals and nutrients up and
down their trunks and theirstems.
And so, with that, it is reallyimportant to recognize in soils
that water has a very difficulttime going from one texture to
another texture.
So let's say this is a reallysandy soil right here, and this
is a really clay soil down here.
(21:41):
If you are watering and it'sraining from the top, this
really sandy, loamy, healthysoil will uh come down and it
won't be able to go through.
It's called a soil interface.
It won't be able to go throughinto that clay.
It's just the way water flowsand the way water works.
And so it will all pool abovethat clay area in your
(22:02):
landscape.
And so they used to do a lot ofuh encouraging you to add
organic material and do a lot ofthings to improve the soil, like
right around when you'replanting a tree or right around
when you're planting a shrub toput a bunch of compost in with
that plant.
Um and that ends up being reallydangerous because what happens
(22:22):
is the water is unable to getthrough through those different
that creates an interface, andso the water is unable to get
through and penetrate thatnative soil.
So what's already there is whatthe plant has.
And so it uh you have a holewhere you dug for the tree, and
it ends up filling that holewith water.
And then what happens is thoseroots end up circling where the
(22:43):
water is, and the roots can'tget through into the clay
either.
And so uh you want to make surewhen you are planting plants, we
don't follow the same oldinformation that we should be
adding all these amendments anddifferent types of all these
amendments and different typesof organic materials and things
into the soil around the plant.
We want to make sure that thatis as close to the native soil
(23:06):
as it possibly can be.
So you can loosen it up, you canmake sure, but it's still gonna
be the same kind of thing andthe water will still be able to
go through it.
So you want to make sure not tobe able not to be creating those
interfaces.
And so there are very few timeswhen we recommend amending the
soil through any landscapeprocesses now, not even for
perennials, because what happensis we want to make sure that the
(23:29):
plants that are there are onesthat can thrive.
If you have super needy thingsthat you really want to grow, a
Japanese maple or a rose of somesort, then absolutely you'll
need to amend the soil and dothat kind of stuff.
But if you're planting a prairiegarden in your backyard, then
you want to use that existingsoil in that area and you don't
want to amend it with a lot ofdifferent things.
(23:50):
So now you can add fertility bydoing compost on the top, which
we'll talk about in a coupleweeks here for the uh Minnesota
gardening members in the weeklylessons.
And so we'll have that piecethere that we'll talk about as
ways we can improve fertility onthings, but underground and in
the soil, we want to mostlyleave it alone and just leave
everybody there at the sametime.
(24:10):
So that's uh water interface isa big thing to think about.
Next one on the list is carbonstorage, and so all these things
are really critical for storingcarbon underground.
So we need to keep moving asmuch of that carbon.
Now, we as you know individualhomeowners cannot impact enough
to change what's happening inthe the greater world, but we
(24:33):
can make a difference if we allpool our resources and do these
things together.
So this is uh Doug Palamy's bigvision for homegrown national
parks.
And so by having enoughhomeowners pooling together and
getting more carbon sunk intotheir into their soil at their
own houses, through trees,through prairie plants, those
kinds of things.
It's really important that wehave that and continue in that
(24:55):
mindset that we are workingtogether to help with these
things.
All right, so now kind of thenuts and bolts of uh things.
We have landscape wellness.
And so we have hopefully you allhave taken it, but if you
haven't yet, you can go to themain menu at
MinnesotaGardening.com and youare able to go in that main menu
and uh take a landscape wellnessquiz.
(25:17):
And so that landscape wellnessquiz gives you a spectrum as to
where we're at on the the healthof your landscape.
And so we want to take folks whoare going from just a very
standard suburban chemical, alllawn, just few plants, uses a
lot of chemicals, uses a lot ofwater to keep that lawn moving.
(25:37):
And uh, we want to make surethat we're going from that to a
thriving, healthy landscape.
And along the way, we've got adetox uh stage, we've got a
nourishing stage, we've got athriving stage is where we want
to get to for thriving, healthylandscapes.
And so that's what we're doingat Minnesota Gardening is
helping people move through thatcontinuum so that we are able to
help reduce the rates of cancer,helping to making sure that we
(26:01):
are saving and feedingpollinators and songbirds,
making sure that we are savingwater and we're doing really
cool things like that, which wecan only do together.
And so it's a good thing.
Mulch is a really importantpiece of this soils concept.
If you think about a prairie, itis completely covered with
plants, and there's no ingeneral, unless you've got a
gopher, there's in general nosoil exposed.
(26:23):
And so all that soil isunderneath of the plant stems
and leaves and old decomposingplant parts from the previous
years.
And so uh it's really importantto emulate that as much as we
possibly can.
And so there's a stupid termcalled green mulch, and uh, I
hate it with a passion, butthat's what it's known as, and
(26:44):
so I'm I'm a follower, I guess,and so we'll uh continue to
follow on the green mulch uh uhtrack here.
But what it is is we want tomake sure that we are using
plants as protection for soil,and so that raindrops cause a
tremendous, shocking amount ofdamage to soil and soil
structure with erosion, andthat's I mean, that's just what
(27:06):
they do.
So we have these landscapes nowthat are a plant with a lot of
mulch, hardwood mulch inbetween, and then another plant
on the other side.
And um, we want to make surethat that whole thing gets
filled up with plants becausemulch is even worse than having
lawn in areas for what itprovides for local ecosystems.
They don't provide anything forit, takes a lot of chemicals to
(27:28):
keep all the weeds out of there.
It takes a lot of water becauseit is generally in an irrigation
system, it doesn't provide anyfood for pollinators or
songbirds or any habitatwhatsoever.
And so we want to make sure thatwe're having as many plants in
there.
And so that's where the stupidgreen mulch term comes from, but
it is what it is.
So we're gonna go with it.
So we want to have green mulchwherever we are in our landscape
(27:51):
beds, and so it's having as manylandscape beds as we can to do
those four things.
Next one is eliminate, uh, stopusing chemicals, stop using
fertilizer wherever you can.
We have a small fertilizerrecommendation for the fall, uh,
which is purely mostly nitrogenfor plant health, and so that we
don't have erosion happening inour lawns.
If our lawns aren't taken careof, they will erode, and so then
(28:13):
we have phosphorus and we havealgae blooms and we have all
these bad things that happen.
So we want to level this playingfield out a little bit and make
sure that uh we are not having aton of erosion.
And so we recommend a half apound of nitrogen per thousand
square feet for our turf in thefall.
Next one is kind of a quandaryfor everyone is no till.
And so a lot of people have aproblem with this one, but we
(28:33):
want to, in order to maintainthose fungal networks that
happen underground, we arelearning more and more every day
that we don't want to dig.
We want to leave those alonebecause every time you stick a
shovel in the ground, uh, itbreaks up those networks and it
breaks up those tubes that areunderground and those uh
connections between the plantsand between the my the different
(28:55):
fungi and different things thatare living underground, um, it
breaks those all up.
And so we highly recommend nottilling and not digging any
holes unless you absolutely haveto for things.
And so there are weeding thathas to get done, there are other
things that have to get done.
But if you are uh building a newbed, don't till it all up.
(29:15):
Again, unless you have to.
There's obviously reasons fordoing that, that kind of thing.
If you have uh food garden beds,you want to promote as many of
those fungi underground as youpossibly can.
So if you have a uh tomato uhthat is growing in the ground
this fall or next spring,whenever you clean up, you just
want to cut that right here, andthen you leave this section
(29:37):
underground.
And so you will uh it'lldecompose quickly, you'll just
plant around it and everythingwill be great.
So leave that there in order tohave all those root systems and
all that things decomposeunderground.
That adds organic material tothe soil, but it also doesn't
cut up the um uh myceliumnetwork, fungal network
underground.
(29:57):
All right, last one for today.
Is organic materials.
So it kind of goes with what Ijust talked about.
And the importance of organicmaterials in our soil is
critical.
And so as you think about, as Iwas talking about western South
Dakota, and as you think aboutthe badlands and the soils out
there, there's no topsoil.
It's just bedrock and substrate.
(30:19):
There's no actual or very littleactual soil that is there on the
ground.
But you get just, you know, acouple hundred miles east of
there.
And uh there is lots of soil.
And so it just depends on whatis going on.
And uh the key differencebetween those two things is
organic material.
So organic material holds thatsoil together, it promotes the
(30:42):
fungal networks, it helps toprovide micronutrients, some
macronutrients, and it helps tokeep all of that soil together.
And so I'm almost done here.
So if you guys have questions,if you have things you want me
to expand on more or talk adnauseum about at you a little
bit more, make sure to add theminto the chat and I will uh
start to answer those questionsas we go uh go through here.
(31:03):
But uh that organic material inthe soil is the number one
differentiator between healthysoils and non-healthy soils.
And so that organic material isalso the fungal networks.
Those are organic materials,those are bacteria that are in
there, and there's just a lot ofdifferent things that really,
really promote organic lifecycles in the soil.
(31:25):
And so you've got if you thinkabout how the roots grow, the
roots grow down into the soiland they die back.
And so then you've got all thesenew pathways for water and for
air to access deeper into thesoil and keep moving that way.
And so that organic material inthe soil is the number one
differentiator.
So you just know, you can smell,you can see that uh dark, rich
(31:46):
soil that's high in organicmatter and just is a wonderful,
wonderful thing to have, whichis why we want to make sure that
we are leaving the leaves.
And so we talked last monthabout leaving the leaves and
making sure that we are haleaving those leaves on top of
the soil so they decompose andthey continue to uh release
nutrients into the ground thatthose plants need.
And so it's uh really, reallygood things that way.
(32:08):
So that is the end of mywhiteboard and of my uh let me
make sure here.
Oh, I've got one more thing.
I just want to make sure thateveryone knows.
Um, right now, here we go.
Um, right now at MinnesotaGardening, there we go, we are
having an October membershipdrive.
And so I want by the end ofOctober to have a hundred
(32:32):
members.
We have like 40 members rightnow, but I want to have a
hundred members by the end ofOctober.
That will between the hundred ofour members, we will literally
save thousands of chemicals fromgoing out on the ground.
We will literally feed millionsof insects and songbirds, and we
(32:52):
will literally save millionsmore gallons of water and save
fresh water.
And so the goal here is toreally collectively work
together and get some thingsdone.
So we're having the Octobermembership drive.
So if you uh aren't a member,please think about joining.
Um, if you are a member, you canabsolutely switch to an annual
membership if you would like ata really cheap rate, but also
(33:16):
make sure to invite friends.
If you have anybody that youknow that would be interested in
being a member of MinnesotaGardening, you can uh invite
them here.
And so we the annual membershipends tomorrow.
We've had it open all this uhpast week at$127.
Sorry, I should say$197.
Annual membership for$197.
(33:36):
Sorry about that, ends tomorrow.
So the end of the day tomorrow,it's the last day to get our
annual membership for$197.
And we've got uh a bunch of newmembers who have come in, and
I'm really, really excited.
It's 56% saving over our monthlymembership of$37 a month.
And so we just want to get asmany people in for the October
membership as we possibly can.
(33:58):
So there's a lot of cool thingsover at Minnesota Gardening, and
please become a member becausethat's how we keep this action
going.
So again,$197 for a month, justgo to MinnesotaGardening.com and
I'll actually add it on here foryou.
And you'll also get an emailhere in 20 minutes or so that
will that will give it to you aswell.
(34:20):
But here's the link if anybodywants to uh join with an annual
membership.
So that's there.
All right, so now I actually getto the questions.
So if you have questions aswell, I'll make sure to add
them.
So Katie says regarding thetomato example and not pulling
plants out, do you leave the cutplant matter on your vegetable
garden beds?
When do you cut them off at thedirt level or do you clear it
out?
So it depends on the plants.
(34:40):
Tomatoes are super umsusceptible to a lot of
different blights and fungus andall sorts of all sorts of
problems.
And so tomatoes I always remove,not always, I generally remove
tomatoes in the fall.
And so just cut those off atsoil level to get the leaves out
of there because the leaves arewhat generally carry all of the
blight types of problems thattomatoes have.
(35:03):
And anybody in the tomatofamily, so tomatoes, potatoes,
eggplant, peppers, those kindsof things, you want to rotate
those, and so you want to nothave them be in the same spot
for more than two, three yearsat the most, and move them to a
different spot after that.
And so, um, so you want torotate those because they are
really susceptible to soil-borneissues, and so I cut them off at
(35:27):
soil level.
Everything else below that isfine, it's not a problem
whatsoever.
And then I toss that all of myflowers, all those other things,
beans, like all those kinds offriends, I leave those all
winter long.
I do not uh clean those up, Ijust let them be, and they
mostly decompose over thewinter.
And uh, if they're a problem,then I cut them back and move
them around in the in thespring.
(35:47):
But most of them are all okay,and they're a cover crop
basically for the winter, andthey work really well that way.
So uh that's how I handle thosein the vegetable flower food
garden type situation.
Liz, annual flowers, I leavemost of those.
I don't cut back, but I I alsodon't care about messy.
If you're somebody who really,either yourself or a partner, is
(36:09):
worried about being tidy all thetime, then maybe that is
something you want to clean up.
But if you have beds that are uhnot going to be seen by anyone
or anything like that, or youdon't care about, then
absolutely leave those.
Um there's zero reason.
Those things can all go backinto they'll decompose, they'll
add nutrients back into theground, and they'll be in good
shape.
Like if you leave cosmos,they'll reseed for you and you
(36:32):
don't uh and you don't need toever plant new cosmos.
So that's the benefit of leavingthose things.
That picture of the tithoniathat I uh put uh in earlier in
the share part.
That Mexican sunflower is avolunteer.
It grew from seed, where theseeds where I planted, not a
single one of those grew.
And so uh I was really happybecause they didn't start to get
(36:54):
big until July, August, thatkind of thing was when they
finally started growing, and itwas pretty cool to see.
Is the rotation locations advicetrue for just tomatoes, or
should we be rotating throughthe raised bed rolls for
everything?
Tomatoes are the number onething, and uh, if you are um
yeah, tomatoes, so anything inthat family that tomatoes are
(37:16):
in, so there's tomatoes,peppers, eggplant, and potatoes,
those are all in the samefamily, and they're all
susceptible to a variety of uhblights, leaf blights generally.
So as you grow your tomatoes,you those those bottom leaves,
they all tend to eventually getgnarly and brown up and and that
(37:36):
kind of thing.
And you can have a lot more itgrows up the stem.
Those are all soil-bornepathogens that are from
splashing, and so it canabsolutely happen.
I don't have too much of aproblem with it at my house.
My mom, she has a huge problemwith it on the farm, and so it's
it's different for everybody.
Um, like I can't, I also have ahuge, huge problem with powdery
(37:59):
mildew.
No matter how much I try, Icannot grow any cucumbers at my
house because I have a hugepowdery mildew issue where
powdery mildew is just here, andso I can't grow tomato, I can't
grow cucumbers.
My peonies get it really bad.
Um, so it's that kind of thing.
So it all depends on yourlocation and what your
experience has been.
(38:20):
If you haven't had a problemwith it and you've been growing
tomatoes there for 10 years,then uh it's not a huge issue
for you, and I wouldn't worryabout it.
Um, but if you do see thingsstart to degrade, move to a
different bed and uh do it, doit differently there.
I hope that answers thequestion.
It wasn't too long-winded onthings.
Um time for a couple morequestions if anybody's got them.
(38:46):
Um I just want to appreciate andsay thanks again to the folks
who uh haven't been here before,who have uh joined, and folks
who haven't who have come towith us today.
So Ellen and Katie, thank youvery much, Katie, for being a
new member.
Robert, Liz, Katie, the otherKatie.
Um, Grady is always great tohave you all here.
I just really, really appreciateeveryone's support.
(39:07):
Please share with your friendsand happy to be here.
So the rest of this month, ourweekly lessons, we have compost
and mulch next week.
We have macronutrients,nitrogen, potassium, and
phosphorus the following week,and then macro new uh
micronutrients and organicmaterial the last week of uh the
and uh then we go into landscapewellness from there, which is
(39:29):
going to be a combination inNovember of reflection and goal
setting and making sure that weare headed the right direction
all together and what we can do.
So that's the month of Novembercoming up, and uh just really
appreciate everybody being here.
So thanks again, all I reallyappreciate it, and uh, I will
see you again soon.
(39:51):
So I will post this tomorrow.
The video will be available forall of our members and the
membership side, and I'll alsopost the audio as a podcast
that'll come up uh tomorrow orthe next day, so that uh we'll
be at the Minnesota Gardeningpodcast that everyone can listen
to.
So thanks all.
Have a wonderful, wonderfulnight.
Uh on behalf of my family, I'mglad that the the internet held
(40:13):
strong for the night.
So we'll be good there.
So hey, September masterclass,yeah, it's posted.
I'll find it and I'll tag you onit.
So we'll we'll roll with that,and I'll make sure that I
actually posted it.
That's the other piece.
So we'll I'll tag you there nomatter what.
So, all right, everybody, thanksfor being awesome, and I'll talk
to you again soon.
See what I mean?
I hope you enjoyed it.
Yesterday, and so I just againwant to invite you that you can
(40:38):
go back to 100 and just so youknow what our goal is with a
hundred members of MiddleGarden.
With 100 members, we will beable over 10 years to eliminate
7,500,000.
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