The Carbon Cycle in Soil and Water Conservation

My first experience at seeing the carbon cycle at work (however I didn’t understand what I was seeing) was out on the West Texas Desert where they were dumping train load after train load of New York belt press sludge directly on top of the dry desert soil.

Fist size chunks of stinky, wet, biologically active biosolids (processed human waste), was being spread several inches apart in the native grass that was very poor and scarce. The annual rainfall in that area is less than ten inches.

During that visit one of the tractor operators came close and in a low voice, as if he didn’t want anyone else to hear, and said “there is something strange about this stuff, it hasn’t rained for a month, surely none of the moisture was getting to the roots, but it seemed like within just a few days the grass actually turned greener and seemed to be growing some.”

My first thoughts were “wishful thinking.” But I too noticed the same thing happen when we put moist biosolids compost on the shoulders of a highway for the Texas Department of Transportation to help stop erosion.

It was a dry year but the few bunches of established grass that still existed, greened up anyway.

Later I again visited the West Texas site where they spread the first New York Biosolids. In areas where there was soil the native grass was green, healthy and so thick you couldn’t see the ground. This is good indication of what the grass in the area was like before it was abused with improper grazing and what it could be like again if properly managed.

After reading some NASA research on global warming I found the missing clue of how plants, especially grass, can green up without rain or irrigation.

When there is a concentration of Carbon Dioxide (CO2) around a plant leaf the pores, called stomata, which have the ability to open and close, stay shut much longer and close quicker after opening. When the stomata are open they release moisture to the air, which has a cooling affect. The NASA scientist concluded that, with the stomata staying shut longer, the lessening of the cooling effect was contributing to global warming.

The NASA scientist didn’t mention that a plant transpires, to the air, ninety nine percent of the water it pulls from the soil. And when the stomata stay closed longer, especially with large volumes of plant leaves, an immense volume of soil moisture could be saved.

Next >>> Plants and the Carbon Cycle