This is an interesting topic (I hope!
:)). The idea is to get at some of those root diseases, obviously, but I
am not sure this is the right way. You have to think about the critters in the
tea more.
Part of the idea here is to get to root diseases, but my real
interest is getting the pertinent microbes where they are needed, the quickest
way possible.
If you inject a fungal tea to try and get
beneficial fungal into the soil foodweb, for example, and kill the fungi in so
doing, then you have fungi foods that the bad fungi can use. Very
tricky. I would think you would want to make some holes and pour tea in as in
after aeration. And once they survive is the tree going to be putting out
enough exudates for the beneificals to survive (actually Shigo suggests a
dying tree might!) Anyhow, what are those fungi going to eat down
there?
Injection directly into the root zone has been used
for mycorrhizal inoculation for many years with, from my
understanding, very good
success. Are Ecto and AM just less susceptible to "death by
injection"?<<<Could be our call to
arms.
Could you provide a reference(s) to
Shigos' work?
I am pretty sure you will get better
results with aeration, perhaps followed by an application of some gentle
microbe food like soy bean meal followed by some good fungal compost tea
with mycorrhizal and then an application of two inches of fungal compost/humus
topped off by the tree's own leaf.
I understand the need to have air and food.
What about situations where the application of 2" of compost is not
possible, like trees planted in a manicured lawn?
Topical application of CT and mycorrhizae is certainly
less than optimum without adequate incorporation or movement in via
irrigation. How many
inches of rain\irrigation does it take to move the microbes into the root
zone?
This way you get to control what is going on. You
know the critters in your tea are fine. No guesses and you get the
microarthropods and worms in the act so you get nutrient
cycling...in this case ammonium, the kind your
tree needs. There is stuff for everyone to eat and the mulch helps
buffer the moisture flow from the soil to the atmosphere.
And, I will go one step further, though you may
laugh.....depending on the size of the diameter around the tree you need to
treat, you might want sprinkle baby oatmeal on the ground before you apply
compost and mulch. You will get great fungi if your compost has good
fungi!
Love
it....always did like oatmeal!
Thank you for all the
great insight.
Tim
Jeff
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