Fruit Bites

Fruit Bites

BL:  Welcome back to another “Fruit Bites” brought to you by Valent U.S.A. With us again is Valent’s Allison Walston. And this week Allison, let’s talk about soil in the PNW?

AW:  Undisturbed soil is typically air, water, organic matter and mostly mineral nutrients. When we relocate, plant into or compost our soil, it changes. 

BL: why are nutrients important in the soil?

AW:  In order for plant roots to uptake nutrients, they need to be there in a form that the plant can uptake. in low levels, plants won’t grow. We can add the big 3, nitrogen, phosphorus & potassium to help adjust for plant needs. We can plant legumes to fix nitrogen. And we can use mycorrhizae.

BL: We typically have low phosphorus levels in our soils, what then? 

AW:  this creates plant stress, which triggers the mycorrhizal spores to germinate. Their hyphae can grow further into smaller nooks & crannies to get more phosphorus, therefore the plant gets more nutrients.

BL: Well, thanks Allison. Join us again next time for Fruit Bites, brought to you by Valent. Until then, I’m Bob Larson.