open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com
The Open Furrow: February 2014
http://open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com/2014_02_01_archive.html
Soil, agriculture, land and life. Soil, Water and Food Production: A Tale of Two Seasons. Food production depends on the two essential ingredients, soil and water. Mineral soil provides the medium for mechanical support and nutrients for plants. Water is the required unit of exchange for the acquisition of essential nutrients and CO. By plants. There is no question that the supply of plant available water has always been a major impediment to realizing greater food production, worldwide. From the Soil Up.
open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com
The Open Furrow: Tomorrow Is Our Impermanent Address
http://open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com/2014/12/tomorrow-is-our-impermanent-address.html
Soil, agriculture, land and life. Tomorrow Is Our Impermanent Address. Floating gardens in Bangladesh. French agencies joint report Agrimonde. Says the state of global agriculture is better than you think. But assumptions are easily punctured, throwing human predictions off course. What are the forces that will shape food and agriculture in 2050? Will farming be human- or robot-centered? Will it be châteaubriand, filet mignon or, an extra helping of Soylent Green. Never took off. The idea of humans c...
open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com
The Open Furrow: Let Us Now Praise Famous Roots
http://open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com/2015/08/let-us-now-praise-famous-roots.html
Soil, agriculture, land and life. Let Us Now Praise Famous Roots. Dr Joe Manu Aduani, breeder CSIR Crops Research Institute Ghana, demonstrates Ampong cassava, an improved mosaic tolerant variety yielding up to 60 t/ha in the humid forest zone. Photo source: YouTube. Back in April, a recruiter with ACDI/VOCA. In Washington, D.C., pitched an upcoming assignment in Ghana aimed at improving cassava root production. The project would be funded through USAID’s Farmer to Farmer. Figure 1. Cassava sticks re...
open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com
The Open Furrow: The Biochar Mystique
http://open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com/2014/08/the-biochar-mystique.html
Soil, agriculture, land and life. Early on, a few intrepid pioneers dip their toes, the “hey look me over” phase. This is followed by a steep rise, middle peak, and finally, a period of waning frequency that characterizes so many natural and human social phenomena. Biochar, the ancient soil amendment of the Amazon, fits this trend perfectly. A recent issue of CSA News. Panel A, below, portrays soil pH. And cation exchange capacity. A statistical measure of uncertainty in the model estimates. Soils of the...
open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com
The Open Furrow: October 2013
http://open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com/2013_10_01_archive.html
Soil, agriculture, land and life. A recent item in Forests News. A blog by the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), about a little known edible evergreen tropical plant. Induced a moment of reflection about food. Precisely, what is the definition of “food”? Does “food” shape human identity, imparting some ineffable stamp on our conscious life? Why are some edibles frowned upon because they’re not raised in fenced feedlots or in equally spaced, weed-free rows? Subscribe to: Posts (Atom).
open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com
The Open Furrow: March 2013
http://open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com/2013_03_01_archive.html
Soil, agriculture, land and life. We kick off this blog with a book review and professional reflection 'Out of the Scientist's Garden', see below. Disclaimer: I have no relations with the book author, nor am I affiliated with the publisher CSIRO. Out of the Scientist’s Garden. If I was starting my agriculture career over again, Australia is the place I would go to prepare for it. Why? Subscribe to: Posts (Atom). Let Us Now Praise Famous Roots. Tomorrow Is Our Impermanent Address. View my complete profile.
open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com
The Open Furrow: April 2014
http://open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com/2014_04_01_archive.html
Soil, agriculture, land and life. Peasants, Farmers and Scientists. Ever hear of farming systems research, training and visit, participatory rural appraisal? And food deficits in many countries are still endemic. What went wrong? Subscribe to: Posts (Atom). Let Us Now Praise Famous Roots. Tomorrow Is Our Impermanent Address. Peasants, Farmers and Scientists. Soil, Water and Food Production: A Tale of Two Seasons. Peasants, Farmers and Scientists. Seven Paths via Spring Hope, North Carolina.
open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com
The Open Furrow: Aye, Rowbot
http://open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com/2013/12/aye-rowbot_21.html
Soil, agriculture, land and life. December is turning out flush on the robot news front, what with Google’s “moon shot” acquisition of Waltham, Mass.-based Boston Dynamics. Maker of borg-ian robotic contraptions with names like BigDog, Cheetah, and Wildcat. Concurrently, there’s the less alien but equally intriguing (at least to us aggies) debut in NPR’s The Salt. Blog, AgFunder News. And Minnesota Business Journal. Two water soluble forms of nitrogen. How does this happen? And, industrial fixation throu...
open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com
The Open Furrow: August 2015
http://open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com/2015_08_01_archive.html
Soil, agriculture, land and life. Let Us Now Praise Famous Roots. Dr Joe Manu Aduani, breeder CSIR Crops Research Institute Ghana, demonstrates Ampong cassava, an improved mosaic tolerant variety yielding up to 60 t/ha in the humid forest zone. Photo source: YouTube. Back in April, a recruiter with ACDI/VOCA. In Washington, D.C., pitched an upcoming assignment in Ghana aimed at improving cassava root production. The project would be funded through USAID’s Farmer to Farmer. Subscribe to: Posts (Atom).
open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com
The Open Furrow: Meditations on Okok
http://open-furrow-soil.blogspot.com/2013/10/meditations-on-okok.html
Soil, agriculture, land and life. A recent item in Forests News. A blog by the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), about a little known edible evergreen tropical plant. Induced a moment of reflection about food. Precisely, what is the definition of “food”? Does “food” shape human identity, imparting some ineffable stamp on our conscious life? Why are some edibles frowned upon because they’re not raised in fenced feedlots or in equally spaced, weed-free rows? Escaped me. I’ve din...Another...