Agroforestry
"Combining trees with crops or livestock is more productive, better for wildlife and healthier for the planet, but only 3% of the UK’s farmland currently practices agroforestry."
https://www.soilassociation.org/causes-campaigns/agroforestry/

#SolarPunkSunday #SoilAssociation #Trees #WildLife #UK #Farming #Agriculture #AgroForestry #Forestry #Forests #Soil

Some of our homemade #compost #soil. It's like gold to us gardeners 💚👩‍🌾
Prepping some large pots with it, to get ready for transplanting of my tomato plants in 2-3 weeks. I put a fish head & banana peel at bottom of each large pot.

#SoilHealth #Gardening #FoodSecurity #NaturalFertilizer #ZeroWaste #FrugalGardening

Relocating the kitchen garden after getting rid of the concrete around it.

You can nicely see the difference between the good soil and the clay rich stuff below in the spot where I scraped too deeply.

The big grading bucket moves dirt fast but unfortunately it just started raining, to my great annoyance. Sprinted out to rescue some stuff and now having coffee while hoping it doesn't get too muddy to continue. 😫

Like most excavator work, it requires a bit of strategy. Here I'm piling the good soil in the middle, then I'll have to move the bad soil over it to fill the gap left behind and then distribute the good soil in the new hole.

#Gardening #ExcavatorGardening #MiniExcavator #Homestead #Soil

Diversity-triggered 2-naphthoic acid exudation recruits keystone microbial taxa to promote soybean #drought tolerance

Microbial diversity boosts #soybean drought tolerance by inducing exudates that recruit beneficial nitrogen‑cycling bacteria.

#microbiome #microbiota #soil #microbiology

https://davidojcius.blogspot.com/2026/04/diversity-triggered-2-naphthoic-acid.html

Are fire-loving fungi mother nature’s first responders after wildfires?

https://fed.brid.gy/r/https://www.optimistdaily.com/2026/04/are-fire-loving-fungi-mother-natures-first-responders-after-wildfires/

Want to learn how to start doing soil animal macrophotography? Or how to improve your current macrophotography? Perhaps you just fancy a rare glimpse into mine and Andy Murray's enigmatic minds? Well, here you go!

A new perspectives article has just dropped in Soil Organisms journal, where Monica Farfan digs into mine and Andy's love for documenting and communicating soil biodiversity using photography! It was a very fun interview, jammed full of macrophotography tips and photos.

It's completely free to access:
https://www.soil-organisms.org/SO/article/view/504/517

#SoilBiodiversity #SoilFauna #Macrophotography #Entomology #Soil #Nature #TheWorldBeneathOurFeet

Another part of backyard that I've been successful doing #soil remediation work on. It's now healthy enough to sow more food/native/groundcover seeds 💚

#gardening #GrowFoodNotLawns #Saanich #VictoriaBC #Hoe #VancouverIsland #VanIsle #AntiLawns #GrowFlowersNotLawns

#Soil microbial diversity associates with lower prevalence of human bacterial pathogens across global soils.

Global soil metagenomes show human pathogens thrive in wet croplands & rise as biodiversity falls under global change.

#microbiota #microbiology

https://davidojcius.blogspot.com/2026/04/soil-microbial-diversity-associates.html