Soil Health & Function

Topic: Use of qPCR to monitor target soil-borne organisms, both harmful and beneficial, in soils, and their relationship to soil health and disease.

• Funder: IAFRI / AHDB
• Newcastle partners: Emma Chapelhow, Julia Cooper 
• Collaborators: Fera Science Ltd

Summary:

The physical and chemical aspects of soil have been widely researched, whereas the biological aspects of soil and their role in overall soil health are still not fully appreciated. Soil biology encompasses both potentially beneficial and harmful interacting communities of micro-organisms and plays a vital role in agricultural systems. By further understanding the soil microbiome and its interactions, actions can be taken to preserve healthy soils and utilise them to our benefit. Given that 40% of crops are lost to diseases and pests each year (Savary et al. 2012), this project aims to identify and quantify pathogens in soil and broaden understanding of their interactions within the overall soil microbiome in response to different soil management practices. By relating soilborne pathogen dynamics to the risk of disease and yield loss, informed and sustainable disease management choices can be made. Initial focus has been mainly on developing molecular techniques for extraction of soil DNA and its quantification using qPCR. This PhD project forms part of the current AHDB Soil Biology and Soil Health (SBSH) Partnership that is investigating the effects of a number of sustainable soil management practices (crop rotations, cover crops, FYM and other organic amendments, biopesticide applications, mycorrhizal fungi applications) on disease incidence/severity and pathogen survival.

Topic:  Newcastle University’s NU-FARMs commercial arable fields provide a unique opportunity for comparison of different tillage practices at a field scale.

Newcastle partners: James Standen, Julia Cooper, Rob Burn, Dave George

Summary:

One field on each of the NU-FARMs three sites (Cockle Park, Ouston and Nafferton Farm) has been identified to compare conventional mouldboard ploughing to minimum tillage (Vaderstad Carrier 650, 5-10 cm depth) and direct drilling (using a John Deere 750a no-till seed drill) within a commercial farming enterprise. Crop yields are monitored using the farm’s precision combine equipment; students are encouraged to use the fields for studies on soil quality, biodiversity, and crop health. Regenerative practices including the use of cover crops will be trialled in these fields. Future funding applications are planned to explore in more detail how spatial variability in soil properties across each field impacts on agronomic outcomes and net carbon storage.  

Links to modules: ACE2063; NES8005; ACE3908 – the fields are used for field studies in ACE2063 (managing soils in the agrienvironment) as well as for student projects at the MSc (NES8005) and undergraduate (ACE3908) level.  

Topic:  A combined farm-scale survey and experimental study that generated the first direct comparison between conventional and organic management under a mixed farming system in the north-east of England.

• Newcastle partners: Caio Fernandes Zani, Julia Cooper, Elisa Lopez-Capel, Gavin Hall, Rachel Chapman and William Taylor.
• Collaborators: Enviresearch Ltd 

Summary:

Different management practices, such as grazing regime (non-grazed vs. grazed), proportions of temporary grass-clover leys in crop rotations (ley time proportion), crop rotation schemes (conventional vs. organic) and fertilisation sources (mineral vs. compost), bring about changes in inputs and outputs of soil organic matter (SOM), soil biodiversity, nutrient cycling, C distribution within SOM pools, molecular composition of SOM and consequently affect soil quality as well as soil C stocks and stability. It is, however, still unclear how those variables would affect the provision of ecosystem services from agricultural soils. This disparity may be due to the lack of comparisons considering more than one driver of change, i.e. not only the agricultural system as a whole but also taking into account the interactions between the systems and core practices (e.g. crop rotation schemes and fertility sources). Additionally, information on distinctive management practices, such as the proportion of grass-clover leys in arable rotations, amount of manure applied, and whether ley periods are used for hay meadow cutting or livestock grazing (i.e. non-grazed vs. grazed), have seldom been considered in previous studies. Lastly, previous studies comparing conventional vs. organic systems have only examined the change in topsoil, but comparable research has demonstrated that soil C in subsoil layers (i.e. > 0.20 m) must also be included. Such aspects are essential for a more holistic soil C stocks assessment under different agricultural systems and if they are not taken into account the results can be misleading. The results of this study can contribute to ongoing efforts to improve the current agricultural systems and management practices, and delivery of a more sustainable agriculture sector, which might be able to mitigate the expected climate change while contributing to soil health and food security aspects.

Topic: Soil health is becoming more and more important to the modern farmer, so understanding how their past decisions will affect their future is vital. 

• Newcastle partners: Julia Cooper, and Dave George
• Collaborators: FERA Science: Ian Adams, John Walshaw

Summary:

This project looks at how the decisions land managers make can affect crop success years down the line. It used the long-term cropping systems experiments at NU-FARMs (QLIF) as a platform for these studies. To achieve this, the effect of tillage on soil moisture retention and crop growth metrics is being quantified, as well as the measurement of the residual effects of past land management practices on extant bulk soil microbial community through the use of eDNA sequencing.

Social media: Twitter: @Mikerobiomes