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I dunno. Back in the day farmers used a system called crop rotation to maintain the soil. One year they planted crop A, the next they planted crop B, and the n
by digi_owl 9y ago
I dunno. Back in the day farmers used a system called crop rotation to maintain the soil.
One year they planted crop A, the next they planted crop B, and the next they left it fallow.
This was before industrial fertilizes mind you, but leaving part of the land fallow is not a bad thing.
- bluGill 9y agoThere are millions of different soil types. The right answer is different for each. Follow is just one useful technique farmers use to build soil, it works in some cases not in others.
- lostapathy 9y agoFarmers today still understand this - better than most non-farmers appreciate. Anybody still farming today is a decent business person, and that means making sure your land stays healthy so your farm has a future. Industrial fertilizers have definitely changed the rules and allow farmers to shift the traditional cycles, but the same principles of caring for the land still apply. Crop rotation is still common, but some land is so much more productive for some uses than others that it makes sense to "weight" the rotation with fertilizers.
- digi_owl 9y agoYeah i fear that very few acknowledge, never mind appreciate, the kind of long term outlook one develops as a farmer. Lifestock, crops, all that happens over years, not weeks or months like in most industries.