Recent Posts

Research demonstrates that chemical contaminants found in wastewater and sewage sludge (aka biosolids) may accumulate in plants.  (EHN Source) 

I have been producing small quantities of biochar at home and using it in my compost.  My equipment is relatively low tech, but my process is reasonably efficient. Those who care deeply about the implications of rising atmospheric CO₂  will invariably ask, can biochar produced in such a low tech system offset the carbon produced by the fire used to create the biochar in the first place?   The answer can be decidedly yes even when efficiency is low if you keep it simple.

 Editor's note:

Wetland delineation in permafrost soils presents a unique challange. Right now I am in Interior Alaska, northeast of Fairbanks conducting a wetland delineation in black spruce (picea mariana) forests underlain by permafrost. One of the trickiest parts of deciphering the wetland soil features is understanding the seasonal timing in relation to the permafrost depth. When I visited this site in mid-May, the seasonal frost was still at 8" below the surface. Now we are running into season frost and/or permafrost at 16" or so.

Hiring a soil scientist as a consultant can be a big leap for a client ...

Version 2 of STATSGO (General Soils Map of the USA) is available for viewing in Google Earth.  Download the kml file from:

http://www.gelib.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/us-soils_nl.kml

With appropriate additional resources this might be used as an educational tool.

In our search for information on how the newly passed Health Care Reform is going to affect our business and our family, wife Rosemary came across a valuable timeline of reform elements.

I want to express my complete and unwavering support for science blogger "GrrlScientist" in her quest to get unfettered pre-publication access to science articles, on par with mainstream media (MSM). 

 Smart Phones such as the Blackberry and iPhone are everywhere. There are several applications or “APPs” as they are known for the iPhone, many of which can be useful to soil scientists. 

Ben Chandler, the congressman from Kentucky’s Sixth District, has received an “Excellence in Soil Stewardship Award” from the Soil Science Society of America for his support of agriculture and conservation.

Another timely article relating to peak phosphorus: