Unlock the power of nature with biological products for stubble degradation and soil enrichment.
Discover how these products harness soil organisms to break down stubble, thus enhancing soil fertility and boosting plant vigor.
Biological products play a crucial role in replenishing macronutrients and micronutrients, contributing towards more resilient crops and increased profits.
Crop residue management that incorporates biologicals uses less tillage passes while increasing the rate of nutrient release into the soil.
Biological Products and Their Role in Stubble Degradation
Biological products are emerging as powerful allies in farming, particularly in the realm of stubble degradation. They contain a broad spectrum of microbe genera that work symbiotically with indigenous microbes to decompose unwanted remnants of prior crops. Agricultural soils have low levels of beneficial decomposing microorganisms. Adding biological products increases the rate of crop residue, or stubble, degradation.
There is a fine line between complete stubble degradation and stubble on the field to protect the soil from biotic and abiotic stresses. Leaving stubble in the field, or stubble mulching, is beneficial.
However, the residue on the ground immobilizes nutrients that could be used by your winter cover crops or winter wheat, especially nitrogen. The goal with biological products is to increase the rate of stubble degradation while maintaining a cover on the soil to protect from erosion, and the force of raindrops, while suppressing weeds. (1)
Stubble can also create difficulties when seeding your next crop. It’s important to have the correct farming equipment. Coulter blades and discs are often all it takes to cut through last year’s stubble, especially after a winter of rain, snow, and thaw. Biological products are part of a farmer or rancher’s toolkit and should be considered just as important as farm equipment.
What are Biological Products?
In the context of crop residue management, biological products can be microbes, humic acids, or enzymes. All three work in unison to decrease stubble mass and increase soil quality.
Humic acids are organic molecules that play essential roles in improving soil properties, plant growth, and increasing microbial populations. Humic acids are 60% carbon, the primary food of microbes.
Enzymes are proteins that create biochemical reactions. They help degrade complex molecules such as cellulose, lignin, and starch – all components of crop residues. Microbes create enzymes and scientists measure soil enzymes to determine which microbial species are in the soil. Enzymes are microbially specific.
Microbes are living organisms such as bacteria, fungi, protozoa, and nematodes (yes, there are beneficial nematodes). They digest organic matter and release nutrients into the soil.
What Are The Benefits of Biologicals in Crop Residue Management?
The increased rate of stubble degradation has several added beneficial effects.
1. Biologicals reduce the risk of pests and diseases that thrive on crop residues, such as corn rootworm, Fusarium, white mold, and Tobacco Mosaic. Synthetics reduce these pests and diseases but they also reduce the beneficial microorganisms.
2. They enhance the performance of cover crops, which add benefits such as erosion control, weed suppression, and nitrogen fixation.
3. Biologicals enhance seed germination and emergence by creating a hospitable seedbed and reducing the amount of physical biomass the new seedling has to push through.
4. They also lower the need for synthetic inputs and decrease the dependency of soil on fertilizers and pesticides.
The greater the biodiversity in your soil, the less available real estate for pathogens. Rhizobacteria, found in the plant root zone, or rhizosphere, aid legumes in fixing nitrogen. Protists, such as protozoa, keep bacterial populations under control.
Nature does a lot of the work for you if you stand back and wait. Yes, your field will be messy. But, when winter snow storms and wind come onto the High Plains and the Midwest, your fields will hold the snow. Whiteout conditions and drifts occur when there isn’t any vegetation as soil cover to hold the snow.
In the spring when you’re ready to plant, those shaggy cover crops will be broken down and ready to plant into. Soil management that allows microbial activity enhances nutrient cycling and increases soil organic matter, trace minerals, and soil biodiversity.
To learn more about stubble degradation with biologicals contact our team at ST Biologicals. We are here to help you succeed.
