Soil Microbial Indicators of Soil Health
The Soil CRC have provided Wheatbelt NRM with some preliminary insights into results of our partnership on a project that hopes to identify robust soil microbial indicators of soil health status and change. The premise of this project is that soil microbial indicators such as nematode populations, pathogens and mycorrhizal fungi, could be measured by farmers through time to understand how land management practices impact on soil health.
The research was centred on two sets of paired sites at Buntine and Newdegate where one farmer has adopted regenerative farming practices, and the adjacent farmer is maintaining conventional farming practices. Initial analysis of the 2022 soil sample data reveals a promising relationship between the structure of nematode populations and land management; where the regenerative farming sites showed significantly more structured food webs than their adjacent conventional counterparts.
At this stage, you might be thinking, what are the mechanisms driving this pattern and how can sampling for soil nematodes be practically implemented on farm? Soil CRC have their work cut out for them crunching the stats on this project and we hope to be able to bring you further updates at our Talkin’ Soil Health symposium held in York on the 13th March 2025. Adding soil microbial indicators to farmer’s toolbox might allow us to demonstrate the holistic benefits of improving soils. Register your interest here.
This work has been supported by the Cooperative Research Centre for High Performance Soils whose activities are funded by the Australian Government's Cooperative Research Centre Program.
Published eNews #396, November 2024