Under our feet, there is a war raging for access to nutrients, water, and energy between beneficial and pathogenic microorganisms. You can try to win with synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, but you’ll only win skirmishes, not the war. There’s a way to gain long-term control over nutrient availability in your soil, a way for your crops to achieve optimum growth and yield.

When you add beneficial microorganisms (biologicals) to your soil, pathogens don’t stand a chance. Here are 7 reasons why:

1. Beneficial microorganisms, when healthy, can outcompete pathogens for nutrients and space. Plant root surfaces are prime real estate, but when you add beneficials as an inoculant, the space is already occupied.
2. Some beneficial microorganisms produce antimicrobial substances such as antibiotics, siderophores, and lytic enzymes that degrade and eventually kill pathogens
3. Plants and beneficial microbes work with each other to create an Induced Systemic Resistance (ISR) in the plant. Without the triggering of the ISR by beneficial microbes, plants are too slow in developing defense mechanisms against pathogens.
4. The diversity of microbial species, especially in the plant root zone, creates a buffer against pathogens. It’s tough for pathogens to get past beneficial microorganisms to infect plant roots.
5. All microorganisms use chemical signaling to communicate needs. Certain species of beneficial organisms can jam the chemical signals put out by pathogens so there is less damage and pathogens are, again, without a food source.
6. Plants have evolved with microorganisms to form symbiotic relationships. Microbes give plants nutrients and water when signaled, and plants give microbes carbon and sugars created through photosynthesis. When this relationship is in balance, plants are healthier and less susceptible to pest or disease pressure.
7. Iron is a critical element for microorganism growth. Beneficial microorganisms not only take up iron in their bodies, but they also produce siderophores that bind to iron so excess iron is unavailable to pathogens. When plants signal they need iron, beneficials give up theirs through direct contact with plant root hairs or by excreting the iron in a plant-available form.

It’s one thing to know beneficial microbes can beat out pathogens, but how do you put this into practice? There are numerous ways to get beneficial microbes on your fields and increase soil fertility.

Compost Tea as a Biological Input

Compost teas are valuable and more easily used by home gardeners and horticulturists. It’s hard to imagine a large enough container for the brewing process. But compost teas used as foliar spray are effective in suppressing disease and speeding up toxin breakdown. You do get a lot of microbial activity in the tea brewing process, but some of those microbes may be pathogens if you’re not aerating your brew tank properly.

It’s easy to make and inexpensive, but let’s face it, it’s time-consuming, must be used immediately, and there are often inconsistent results. The variability in water, processing time, and the composted materials used all add up to a brew that can’t be replicated. That makes it difficult to maintain proper records.

Fermenting Organic Matter to Use as a Biological Soil Amendment

Like compost tea, fermenting organic matter is cheap, easily available, and does a bang-up job of improving nutrient bioavailability and absorption.

When you think of fermented organic matter, is sauerkraut the first thing that comes to mind? Most fermented soil amendments generate a lot of greenhouse gases. Do you remember the danger of a silo full of corn silage? Those greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and hydrogen sulfide.

With proper care, you can mitigate these emissions. But like compost tea, this is a process that takes time. If you buy a fermented product from the feed store or local supplier, most of the microbes are missing because it has had to be pasteurized, and we all know heat kills the good with the bad.

Is Manure Available to You as a Soil Amendment?

For generations, this has been a soil amendment of choice. But that was when livestock were common on farms. With specialization, manure has become either a limited available commodity or riddled with contamination issues.

Manures are great at recycling nutrients because they come with their own populations of microbes. And it’s good at suppressing disease and pests that try to outcompete the resident microbes.

We all know when the neighbor is amending his soil with manure. It’s that wonderful farmyard smell we’ve come to associate with the manure spreader. Manure is high in nutrients that may not be needed by the crops at the time of spreading. That creates a high probability of nutrient leaching into groundwater or surface water.

Manure brings with it flies and other insect pests. On today’s farms there’s also the potential for chemical contamination if the manure comes from a confined animal feed operation.

Broad Spectrum Biological Soil Amendments

On the row crop farm, many do-it-yourself biologicals are too time-consuming or unstable. They have to be used immediately and that doesn’t always fit into a farm schedule. But there are products that are formulated for a longer shelf-life (though not as long as synthetics) for microbial populations.

At ST Biologicals we’ve tested many biological products and have found BIOACTIVE LIquiLife+™ to have the most diverse microbial genera and be the easiest to use.

Trials done by Beck’s in 2022 on soybeans showed an increase in productivity of 2.7 bu/acre with BIOACTIVE LiquiLife+™, which resulted that year in an increase on ROI/bushel of $76.15.

Corn trials in 2021 by Purple Cow Organics and Agri-Tech Consulting used carbon and the LiquiLife biology instead of a full treatment of nitrogen fertilizer (UAN). A reduction of UAN by 30 percent with the addition of the less expensive LiquiLife and liquid carbon resulted in a profit increase.

These results are indicative of many tests we’ve done over the years. It’s possible to have profit the first year of converting to regenerative agricultural practices. You don’t have to stop chemical inputs cold-turkey. It’s not an either-or. Decrease synthetic inputs, test, and then add nutrients as a foliar spray if needed. But when you let nature do most of the work, you’ll spend less time and money with your tractor.

Now is the time to put your 2025 crop plan in place. Contact our team at ST Biologicals and we’ll guide you to a higher ROI for this growing season.