Crow Soil Ecology & Biogeochemistry Lab

In our first major field campaign since 2018, the Hawaiʻi Soil Health Research Team are tackling Andisols (volcanic ash soils) on the Big Island this month. A cooperative agreement with the NRCS through Dynamic Soil Properties 4 Soil Health provides the chance to investigate udands and ustands under “natural” conditions, intermediate disturbance, and intensive cultivation. As a result, we can better understand our proposed Hawaiʻi Soil Health Indicators and align with the national database. Also, our team get to spend July on the Big Island!

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Who: Martin A. Sampson Benavides is a Visiting Scholar and recent B.S. graduate of the Panamerican Agricultural University, Zamorano, Honduras.

Inspiration: Martin is inspired to help farmers in Nicaragua be sustainable and efficient and to achieve that a strong background in soil science is needed, which does not stop in the field.

With most experience in the field, Martin wanted to complement that knowledge with laboratory experience and learn more about the science behind soil health. For the past several months, Martin primarily provided much needed assistance in the lab analyzing a back-log of soil health samples in preparation for a wave (maybe tsunami is better wording) of samples expected starting in the summer. In addition to his previous experience as an intern, researcher, and farm production supervisor, the laboratory experience will help him be as holistic as possible for his future career goals that may include running a laboratory himself

This summer, Martin will return to the field providing much needed and appreciated assistance with a post-pandemic field campaign to sample 2 Andisols, under 3 land uses, each at 5 locations around the island. From that, we will be able to compare our Hawaii Soil Health parameters to the national NRCS parameters directly.

“I’m a soil scientist and there’s decades of science on how agricultural practices do, or don’t build up soil carbon. And yet, we still lack the fundamental ability to say, if you do this action, in this place, we can predict soil carbon changes with X percent accuracy.” Stephen Wood, Senior Scientist The Nature Conservancy – well said @wooddecomp@ In their recent paper in Conservation Science and practice Stephen and his coauthors, lay out guidelines for successfully gearing research to decision makers, something we struggle with in our research group all the time these days. A discussion with them by ‘About Cool Green Science’ summarizes their views, provides additional links, and shares this guidance:

Please consider submitting an abstract to the following soil health session at the American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting. Submissions are due July 29. 

This will be a mostly-virtual meeting, with much of the content available on-demand from Dec 1-17, 2020, and much of the live content occurring Dec 10-17.

We are planning a great panel discussion on the connectivity of soil organic matter, soil function, and soil health, with scientists representing the spectrum of on-the-farm to theoretical research. Invited speakers include Johan Six (ETH Zurich), Asmeret Berhe (UC Merced), Jeff Mitchell (UCANR), Kristin Veum (USDA-ARS), and Eric Slessarev (LLNL). 

In addition to the panel, we seek contributions for oral and poster sessions from the community.

Although not formalized yet, the planning committee has shared that “oral” sessions will likely combine pre-recorded talks with a live Q+A session. “Poster” sessions will likely be held using the platform AGU has used in the past for eLightning sessions. This will allow presenters to create a digital interactive poster (examples from Fall Meeting 2019 are available here).

Please submit abstracts here.

Sincerely, 

Claire Phillips (USDA-ARS), Daniel Liptzin (Soil Health Institute), and Susan Crow (Univ of Hawaii)

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Casey McGrath departs the Crow Lab to (remotely) begin a Post Masters Research Associate – Environmental Data Analyst position at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, WA.  For her M.S. Thesis, Casey established an innovative deep soil warming field experiment at the Lyon Arboretum in Hawaii and measured ecosystem carbon flux for one year of heating.  Unlike any deep soil warming experiment to date, there was no significant respiration response to augmented soil temperatures past the surface layer. Multimodal analysis confirmed the hypothesis that high concentrations of amorphous minerals were the primary driver of the lack of respiration response, followed by high relative soil moisture and low bacterial richness. Casey graduated in Fall 2019 with her M.S. from University of Hawaii Manoa and a manuscript is nearly complete describing the findings. She hands off the field trial to the next student ready to pick up the project and focus the next phase on warming-related changes to microbial community structure and function.  We miss Casey’s inquisitive, driven, and always positive attitude (and her baking) already in the Crow Lab, and wish her all the best in the next phase of her scientific career!

Elaine Vizka (center) shows off the range of soils and effects of bare surface, soil cover, and living roots on erosion and runoff to local high school students with the help of Casey McGrath (right).

Elaine recently received exciting news that her Graduate Student proposal to Western SARE (Sustainable Agriculture Research & Education) is funded.  Her project is titled “A Hawaiʻi Soil Health Index to Guide Farmer Adoption of Sustainable Management Practices”.  Her research will establish criterion for a farmer incentive program for sustainable management, use soil health to improve air and water quality, mitigate climate change, and maintain our soil resources, and empower producer decision-making through the workshops and web tool.

The State of Hawaiʻi enacted the Greenhouse Gas Sequestration Task Force act to begin establishing soil health criterion for a certification program where farmers and landowners may be rewarded for healthy management practices. For soil health to be accurately used as a tool, the indicators must be calibrated for local conditions to establish sensitive farmer accessible indicators, threshold values of measured indicators, and to understand soil health’s relationship to yield and carbon sequestration. Previous research identified 14 sensitive soil health indicators for Hawaiʻi, but these need to be further refined to calculate soil health scores and indices and to be relevant to farmer needs, including yield. Elaine’s research will address these shortcomings by establishing replicated on-field demonstration trials of varying management practices. She also will work with farmers and facilitate farmer-to-farmer training sessions and farm tours through annual soil health workshops.

Congratulations Elaine!

Secrets of the belowground ecology of tropical perennial grasses help explain carbon drawdown in soils managed without tillage.

In three words – Roots.  Microbes.  Minerals.

Visible, aboveground greenery is grand and very easy to measure, but the belowground environment (and the organisms that occupy it) is more critical for climate smart and healthy soils.  Belowground organisms include roots and microbes that interact with each other and soil minerals via multiple processes to collectively store carbon in high-functioning, climate smart and healthy soils.

Perennial grass species with massive root systems having characteristically low lignin concentration accumulated the most soil carbon during cultivation. Microbial decomposition of dead roots did not result in carbon losses as might be expected, but carbon gains as plant and microbe-derived organic matter quickly transformed from plant debris to mineral-bound organic molecules.  Once protected on mineral surfaces, carbon resists further decomposition and accumulates.

Importantly, we tested whether warmer conditions expected with climate change may alter the balance.  While the rate of accumulation slowed a bit, carbon accumulated nonetheless – a welcome bit of good news on the climate change mitigation front.

The results summarized here and in the animation are published in a series of three peer-reviewed papers available to the public here, here, and here.

Perspectives for Hawaii – Reports on scientific papers appear in news feeds and social media, but what do the results mean for Hawaii?  How, or does, it apply?

I tweeted about this Yale paper headlining “link between soil and crop yield is valid – to a point”.  An assessment of available crop yield and soil carbon data globally showed more carbon associated with higher yield but only up to concentrations of 2% carbon.

In Hawaii, we’ve measured carbon in some of the most degraded agricultural settings and, at least in the surface soils, the concentration is nearly 2%.  Volcanic ash soils such as those abundant on the Big Island and elsewhere, even when degraded, can range from 6 to 38% carbon.

Does this mean we can’t expect improved yields with climate smart practices meant to increase soil health and promote GHG sequestration in Hawaii?  No.

The authors clarify “Because all locations will have different thresholds of how much a soil property can be changed and what level of a soil property is ‘good’ for that place”.  The value of this synthesis is that it is a quantitative starting point to guide policy and practice to establish targets, but place-based relationships between soil carbon, organic matter, and crop yields must be established.

Carbon comprises about 50% of soil organic matter, which is a central component of soil health.  Organic matter in soil provides substrate for the microbiome that releases nutrients through their metabolic activity, improves water relations, and increases aeration, all of which improve soil health and more.

Hawaii’s soils may have a high starting point for carbon, but they also have high potential to store even more due to deep soil profiles, volcanic ash deposits, and high productivity.  The more organic matter accumulates, and is stored within multiple carbon pools in healthy, productive agroecosystems, the more climate, soil health, and yield benefits may be achieved.

Please see some of our research results on our project page for more details.

A hard deadline, such as your advisor leaving the country on sabbatical leave, is a reliable incentive for productive bursts. Two Crow lab students, Hannah Hubanks and Daniel Richardson, defended their theses late last year.

Hannah deduced parameters to comprise a future soil heath assessment for Hawaii’s range of cropland, grassland, and forested landscapes.  Daniel measured the biological indicators of soil health four years after a heavily degraded agricultural soil converted to zero tillage management of tropical perennial grasses cultivated for biofuel production.  The legacy of past intensive cultivation is evident in soil health even after long periods of abandonment and/or conservation management practices. Recognition and understanding of the unique challenges posed by the reclamation, reforestation, or improved management of previously intensively cultivated lands is critical for realistic expectations of carbon drawdown and productivity and provision of adequate support for those willing to invest in improving degraded lands.