Weeds Can Talk To Us?

SD51555

5 year old buck +
I came across a very interesting little list from a soil lab website. It's a list of weeds that commonly appear under certain soil conditions. When I reflect on what is very prevalent on my land and what I've battled back on the homestead, this makes a ton of sense.

http://www.spectrumanalytic.com/support/library/ff/Common_Conditions_That_Promote_Certain_Weeds.htm

Some examples:

*Clover: low nitrogen soils. I have tons of wild clovers, and zero N in my soil sample. Although no clover where I sampled.
*Vetch: low nitrogen soils.
*Foxtail: low fertility soils. Explains my awesome clover plot that I had to mow the foxtail out of.
*Wild strawberry in low pH soils. I have it all over up north. PH listed as 5.6 on my first soil sample.

Don't know that I could ID anything else on that list.
 
Yup they are great indicators on many many things like compaction, ph, basically everything
 
I found it very interesting that nitrogen fixers like clover and vetch would naturally occur in low fertility soils. In a way it makes sense they would thrive beings they can bring their own nitrogen. It also got me to thinking that with those traits in place, the soil can heal itself by hosting the plants needed to bring up the fertility, or by being less hospitable to those that need more fertility. Either way, it makes an interesting case for why untouched land in places can put out gangbuster plots with a little amending (not withstanding lack of OM or high sand levels of course).
 
Top