Give Soil New Life With Biologically Enhanced Compost
September 6, 2024 As a first-generation farmer (and late bloomer, at that), Troy Swift has no trouble taking contrarian approaches to growing pecans on his Texas ranch. Regenerative agriculture agrees with him just fine, even if the philosophy, he believes, is just as much about common sense as it is new age. “Smart farming” is how he puts it.
“Farmers have paradigms they grew up with,” Swift, 65, says. “I’m a little bit lucky in that manner because I’m a first-generation farmer. I don’t have the paradigms that my dad and granddad had when it comes to farming.”
In turn, risk tolerance runs through Swift River Pecans and its 266 acres of native and improved pecan trees, split between two orchards. The original farm, where some native trees range between 200 and 300 years old, sits on the banks of the San Marcos River in Fentress, TX.
“If I make a mistake and lose a crop or get less of a crop because of a decision I made while trying these regenerative techniques, I’m not going to fire myself,” Swift says.
Typically, Swift says, farmers adopt regenerative techniques a few acres at a time to “get comfortable.” They do not, he stresses, “put all of their eggs in one basket early.”
“I put all my eggs in one basket pretty early,” he then jokes. “But, again, I’m not going to fire myself.”
Hello Johnson-Su: Recipe for Success
One of several regenerative techniques that Swift now swears by involves not baskets for eggs but homemade bins for compost.
The Johnson-Su Bioreactor, designed by University of New Mexico Molecular Biologist David Johnson and his wife Hui-Chun Su, creates compost that teems with microorganisms, which improve soil health and plant growth and increase the soil’s potential to sequester carbon.
“If you haven’t heard of a Johnson-Su Bioreactor, then look it up,” Swift says. “This is how you make compost — fast — out of high carbon material.”
While compost is generally considered as a way to apply nutrients to the soil, the Johnson-Su Bioreactor produces biologically enhanced compost by creating an environment in which beneficial soil microorganisms thrive and multiply. When the biologically alive compost is applied to the soil, the microorganisms inoculate the soil and work in harmony with growing plants to improve soil health and increase the amount of carbon drawn out of the atmosphere and into the soil.
Swift builds his own bioreactors. Anyone can do likewise, professional grower or not. One bioreactor can be built in four to five hours by one person, using simple tools and about $40 of readily available materials. The design is scalable for home, farm or commercial settings.
For more, click here to continue reading the full article as part of our special report on Soil Health.
In addition, check out the previous reports in Meister’s Global Insight Series covering a range of topics from Irrigation Innovations to Agricultural Technology.
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