Lime Question

[SD51555]

That is because: 1) I am not the one advocating a nutrient program for my own soils that is contrary to commonly accepted practice, 2) my test results are a only a function of renovating severaly abused land and my willingness/unwillinness to invest very large amounts of time and money to renovate various quanitites of acres to various degrees 3) my test results show only a snippet in time that is not reflective of where the nutrient levels recently were or are now.

That being said, here is one just to respond to your request. This field had a PH of 5.2 and a Ca base saturation of 20 when I began working on it just a few years ago.

View attachment 22634

You better switch to dolomitic lime before you get any further outta whack.

Where do you get these fertilizers? And how much are they?

 

[White Birch Farm]

There is nothing out of whack in that field, with the exception perhaps of low NPK after my fall crop and 6 months of rain. As I tried to explain, you shouldnt be jumping to any conclusions looking at just that snippet in time. There is a reason that the first thing any respectable agronomist asks before they interprete your soil test is...when was the last time you applied lime, how much and did you incorporate it? (Relatively speaking not long ago, a lot and not yet fully, which is why you will see that apparently high CA lbs/acre drop off with my next test. )

As for Dolomitic...people get that wrong way too often. It is used when Mg rates need to be driven strongly higher. That is the last thing my soil needs. Take a look at my base saturation levels (it was 7% when I began) and keep in mind that, while this is a silt loam most people would mistake it for clay wetlands. (If I choose to lime any time soon calcitic lime continues to be a sufficient source of Mg for my needs.)

 

[SD51555]

There is nothing out of whack in that field, with the exception perhaps of low NPK after my fall crop and 6 months of rain. As I tried to explain, you shouldnt be jumping to any conclusions looking at just that snippet in time. There is a reason that the first thing any respectable agronomist asks before they interprete your soil test is...when was the last time you applied lime, how much and did you incorporate it? (Relatively speaking not long ago, a lot and not yet fully, which is why you will see that apparently high CA lbs/acre drop off with my next test. )

As for Dolomitic...people get that wrong way too often. It is used when Mg rates need to be driven strongly higher. That is the last thing my soil needs. Take a look at my base saturation levels (it was 7% when I began) and keep in mind that, while this is a silt loam most people would mistake it for clay wetlands. (If I choose to lime any time soon calcitic lime continues to be a sufficient source of Mg for my needs.)

How much magnesium is in your calcitic lime? When I buy mine, the magnesium content is almost zero. I wouldn't want to drive my calcium any higher than 80%, especially with potassium already behind and pH on the lower end of ideal.

Side note, I found a recommendation of an application of gypsum as a source of sulfur from world renowned SDSU agronomists and hosts of the nationally broadcasted Ag Phd television, radio, and podcast show. I won't declare this indisputable fact and bar it's further discussion though. I think it should be hotly debated vs the costs of these fertilizers as a source of sulfur.



(Where can the average Steve Cloverplotter get this stuff, and how much is it by the way? Bag or ton is fine)

You can skip to the 3:43 mark if you don't want to watch the whole thing. I'd recommend backing up a ways though because other nitrogen fertilizers with sulfur in them are also called out as an expensive way of adding S.

 

[White Birch Farm]

I wouldn't want to drive my calcium any higher than 80%, especially with potassium already behind and pH on the lower end of ideal.

You have to remember...Ca base saturation and PH are essentially relatively interchangable. Stated another way, my Ca base saturation cant get to 80% without my PH rising toward 7. (Which is closer to where it is already.)

You also have to remeber that potasium levels are reflective of recent fertilization rates in active plots. They dont sit. That potasium would have been higher last fall shortly after I fertilized. Probably some place between the two now and will rise higher when I fertilize again this year as I am building plan, not simply a maintaince or mining plan.

 

[White Birch Farm]

I'd recommend backing up a ways though because other nitrogen fertilizers with sulfur in them are also called out as an expensive way of adding S.

Of course it is expensive if you devalue the nitrogen and only focus on the sulphur. However, very few people who need sulphur have zero use for the nitrogen. So, to correctly value the product you shouldnt be focused on just the sulphur component. More importantly, if you cant use the nitrogen there are other fertilizers with sulphur and potasium or phosphorous instead.

I can buy all of these at the local Growmark either in bulk or bagged. I can also just tell my fertilizer guy to add “x” lbs of sulphur to a liquid mix with all my other fertilizers and micro-nutrients and humics if I want and have him spray it all in one shot.

 

[yoderjac]

I see lots of beautiful, lush, clean plots in the pics with good discussions of soil amendments. Just the opposite of where I'm headed. I've a long ways to go, but unlike a farmer, my goal is ugly plots with a mix of my planted fall crops and native weeds producing quality deer food with little if any soil amendment. Rather than high-input/high-yield approach, I'm shooting for long-term soil health with good nutrient cycling and an active microbiome producing quality deer food to supplement stress periods when nature is stingy.

My plan is not to try to create it through adding amendments, but to first, do no harm to what I have, and then mix and rotate grasses and legumes and let nature heal which I've destroyed with a plow. I realize it will take a long time to achieve this but that is where I'm headed with food plots. Eventually, I see a mix of deer friendly hard and soft mast trees spaced in fields with a clover/forb base for many of my plots. I'm beginning to think of them as more wildlife openings rather than food plots.

I started with a high-input approach but over time I'm evolving a more sustainable approach that slightly bends nature to favor deer and other wildlife using a patch-work approach that allows nature to cycle through succession in individual blocks to continuously have areas of different succession in proximity.

Over the years, I'm finding the more I try to bend nature, the more effort and cost that is required and the less positive impact I have on deer for the time and money.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Bill]

Yep it’s officially February. :)

I have no graphs. But Don’t add N to clover once it’s established or you’ll get grass.

And I’ll reread this a few times because I’m really tired of using cleth to get rid of it.

Oh and don’t piss on it either. Works great in a scrape. But it seems to burn the clover in August.

 

[White Birch Farm]

How much magnesium is in your calcitic lime?

Technically, here are the general parameters that define calcitic vs dolomitic...

“Calcitic lime is composed of mostly CaCO3 (> 30 percent Ca) with some MgCO3 (<5 percent Mg). Dolomitic lime contains less CaCO3 (<30 percent Ca) and more MgCO3 (>5 percent) than calcitic lime.”

More specifically, for your perspective, with the addition of lime alone my base saturation moved at a ratio of approximately 1:7. Mg/Ca, which is certainly a meaningful amount that is close to an optimal total Mg/Ca ratio.

 

[White Birch Farm]

I see lots of beautiful, lush, clean plots in the pics with good discussions of soil amendments. Just the opposite of where I'm headed. I've a long ways to go, but unlike a farmer, my goal is ugly plots with a mix of my planted fall crops and native weeds producing quality deer food with little if any soil amendment. Rather than high-input/high-yield approach....

You only saw pieces of the 10 acres of my land that I call food plots. What you didnt see is the other 30+ acres of fields that I dont call plots, but are to the extend you are discussing.

 

[SD51555]

to correctly value the product you shouldnt be focused on just the sulphur component.

If all I'm after is the sulfur, then any presence of nitrogen would not only not be of value but create a problem, like free nitrogen to feed encroaching grasses. Asset one day, liability the next.

Anyway, I think we've accomplished a lot of good with this discussion. Can't say we didn't put on a good discussion. It's up to everyone individually to do what they're gonna do and see what they get. Good luck to all.

 

[H20fwler]

If I used gypsum in place of the lime and sulphur I would have completely wasted my money. That is a fact not open to debate.

Except it is given a decent PH to start with...if you used gypsum whatever your trying to grow could use the calcium and sulphur better without a PH swing and you would have saved money and amended your dirt... those pesky facts.

 

[White Birch Farm]

Side note, I found a recommendation of an application of gypsum as a source of sulfur from world renowned SDSU agronomists and hosts of the nationally broadcasted Ag Phd television, radio, and podcast show.

That video did nothing to support your particular arguments (using for purposes orhe than its two primary purposes) for Gypsum. In fact, it undermines it by stating exactly what I have, which is that are plenty of other alternatives that may make sense. Additionally, he goes so far as to point out that his source of Ag is also a source of lime, a fact that further undermines your particular arguments for gypsum.

 

[White Birch Farm]

Except it is given a decent PH to start with...if you used gypsum whatever your trying to grow could use the calcium and sulphur better without a PH swing and you would have saved money and amended your dirt... those pesky facts.

Wow...just Wow.

You are really are not following this. My starting PH was 5.2 not long ago, and is now 6.5....by your own admission you agree that if I used Gypsum it would still be 5.2. That would have been a complete and utter waste for my intended purposes. My Sulphur levels are also steady year over year and at proper levels for my crop needs at planting, without having spent needless amounts of money on excess sulphur that is prone to leaching.

You may want to start paying attention to the pesky facts. You seem to repeatedly be misunderstanding and or misrepresenting them.

 

[SD51555]

That video did nothing to support your particular arguments (using for purposes orhe than its two primary purposes) for Gypsum. In fact, it undermines it by stating exactly what I have, which is that are plenty of other alternatives that may make sense. Additionally, he goes so far as to point out that his source of Ag is also a source of lime, a fact that further undermines your particular arguments for gypsum.

You win man. You win.

Everybody go put 150lbs/acre of ammonium sulfate on your clover this spring. That'll get you to about 40lbs S/acre which will get you to 20 ppm S which is good enough for any crop we're growing for deer.

 

[White Birch Farm]

Everybody go put 150lbs/acre of ammonium sulfate on your clover this spring. That'll get you to about 40lbs S/acre which will get you to 20 ppm S which is good enough for any crop we're growing for deer.

That is a nonsensical statment. It presumes the soil contains zero sulphur, which is completly unrealistic for a food plot.

Reality is, most guys with reasonably health plots will need about 1/3 or less of what you are proposing annually.

 

[White Birch Farm]

http://www.sakg.co.za/portal-downloads/e9993eca-cb87-4639-8cf2-6067e007418f.pdf

“This is also why gypsum, which contains
about 20% calcium and 17% sulphur, should ONLY be used when calcium is above 60% (base saturation). But because gypsum contains sulphur, the excess sulphur and nitrogen will STRIP the soil if CALCIUM is below 60%.
Once the calcium level is above 60%, the sulphur in gypsum will strip the soil of other cations that are in excess. It’s therefore a good product to use where there is an excess of magnesium, but the calcium level is in the desirabable”
...

Getting back to the original topic. Paragraph one directly addressed why H2Os continued implication that gypsum is a good product to randomly apply in a previously unfertilized woodlot in NY is a bad recomendation (where the CA base saturation would almost certainly be below 60, and if it werent, suggesting the use of gypsum to add Ca without any understanding of soil qualities and nutrient levels would make even less sense). In reality, he doesn’t seem to understand that it would actually have the opposite effect of what he mistakenly thought it would.

Paragraph two adresses the fallacy of his continued statements that I should use Gypsum on the soils that are the subject of the test I posted. First, (if my fields were static, which they are not) I don’t need more calcium, but if I wanted to push it I would at least want the benefit of raising my PH toward 7, also I don’t want to reduce my magnesium. (Heck...Even SD who seems to have previously sided with H20 on ever was recomending that I do the exact opposite and try to use dolomitic lime to RAISE my Mg levels.)

 

[Kooch]

I woke up this morning and poured myself a cup of coffee, logged into HT ready to keep reading a good old gypsum fight. You are all really letting me down. This didn't devolve into name calling or serious posturing Internet tough guy stuff. I'm upset that you were able to keep it civil. Try harder.

 

[Bowsnbucks]

I think I'm gonna RUN ……………. RUN ………….. to get my soil tests done. Not being a farmer - this is way too tech-y for my camp's needs. I'm going to rely on Penn State's recommendations. We won't make the cover of any magazines, but we do OK - at least so far. We'll tune up as per PSU.

^^^^^ Kooch - I fell asleep at my computer around 11 pm watching the sparring here. Popcorn and drool all over my desk.

 

[White Birch Farm]

I think I'm gonna RUN ……………. RUN ………….. to get my soil tests done. Not being a farmer - this is way too tech-y for my camp's needs. I'm going to rely on Penn State's recommendations. We won't make the cover of any magazines, but we do OK - at least so far. We'll tune up as per PSU.

Unless you have something very unique going on, I can tell you with a very high level of confidence that they will recomend the addition of lime and you will see no mention of gypsum.

 

[Kooch]

I think I'm gonna RUN ……………. RUN ………….. to get my soil tests done. Not being a farmer - this is way too tech-y for my camp's needs. I'm going to rely on Penn State's recommendations. We won't make the cover of any magazines, but we do OK - at least so far. We'll tune up as per PSU.

Yeah me too. There's a full-service fertilizer shop near my house. This year, I'm just going to run down there with my soil test results in hand and tell them what I want to plant and how. Between those guys and the dude at the Vermillion MN Elevator I suppose I'll get some decent advice. Last year, the elevator guy thought I was dumb for pouring on the fertilizer and lime per the soil test. I actually did put somewhat LESS than recommended do to cost and time constraints, but not on the lime. "Man you're spending a lot of money. It's just deer dude." The fertilizer guy will blend exactly what I need at no extra cost, with just a one bag minimum. I'm looking forward just spreading a custom mixture this season.

Unless I get more area opened up, I'm laying off the lime for a year to let what I've already put down do whatever it's going to do for a year.

I do hope I can back off the fertilizers in the future as I cycle cover crops in and out and feed deer. My place has never seen a plow or disk and I doubt it ever will.