Feeding Your Soil - Step #6

Inoculation upon first roots/transplant

Inoculation upon first roots is an essential step in proper establishment of biological life in a living soil system. This critical step is important because it is a landmark in root development. In the vegetative stage, inoculating with proper soil microbes and fungi early will stimulate root proliferation and make the rhizosphere explode with growth. In some cases, you may even see more root growth than plant growth. This is not at all a bad thing! The more roots your plants have, the greater their ability to uptake nutrients, regulate waste, speak to other plants and provide a home for entomology and atmospheric fixing microbes. 

Inoculation upon transplant is another important landmark in microbial establishment. Inoculating at this juncture is important because it sets the stage for all roots that develop from then on. If done properly, roots take these microbes and fungi along for the ride with them as they grow outward. This not only assists with the actual mechanical mode of movement for these little wonders, but it also gives them a home as they continue to grow. Forgetting to perform an input of these microbes during transplant will make it difficult for those non-flagellated microbes that are not motile to get to the roots where they need to be to establish themselves and begin to multiply, divide and form colonies. Even with motile flagellated microbes, they need to be in at least a semi-aqueous solution in order to achieve that mobility of any significance.

Tune in Wednesday for…

Feeding Your Soil - Step #7 : Frequent Inoculation

Additional Resources: 

"Teaming with Microbes" by Jeff Lowenfels

"Teaming with Fungi" by Jeff Lowenfels