Video teaches soil building, from the ground up

A new video, "Building Alaska Garden Soils from the Ground Up," has been prepared by SNRAS. "It's a wonderful teaching tool that gives us the opportunity provide outreach," Carol Lewis, SNRAS dean and director of the Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station, said. "We want to be out in the villages but we don't have the personnel to do that. This is one more step toward food security for our state."

Funding was provided by the Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education program. Before starting the project, SNRAS researchers determined that many Alaska communities have an interest in food production but perceived a lack of adequate soils. Problems include thin root zones, nutrient-poor soils with low organic material content and some issues with permafrost. Despite the high cost of shipping, some producers import their soil on a barge or through the U.S. mail, unaware that many of the necessary soil components can be found locally.

The research focused on soil improvement methodologies in two different ways. First, the research component compared the nutrient availability throughout the growing season in locally built and amended soils, with locally built and synthetically fertilized soils. Secondly, it compared the vegetable yield grown in both types of soil, using potatoes as the common crop.

Producers in five different locations, representing each “region” of Alaska, built four raised-beds and filled them with locally manufactured soils with technical guidance. Two beds were fertilized with local organic nutrient sources and two beds were fertilized with conventional fertilizer. Using potatoes as an indicator crop, biweekly soil samples were evaluated for nutrient availability and potato yield data was collected.  After soil data was analyzed, recommendations for further amendments will be given to the producers so they have a guideline for improving crop yields the following growing season.

With assistance from UAF Cooperative Extension Service, soil workshops were held in Angoon and Bethel.
 
Building Alaska Garden Soils from the Ground Up project was designed to get Alaskans growing food in raised-beds and to motivate and educate local producers by teaching them how to build garden soils from locally available materials. The research component provided the appropriate rates of local organic soil nutrient resources to support the producers. The use of local materials and educating the producers both provide a solid foundation for sustainable agriculture in Alaska communities. The research done to determine nutrient values of local materials will help producers throughout the state by identifying sources of important plant nutrients.