Cucumber Plants slowly dying

[Meadowlark]

My soil tests out 63 ppm phosphorous and 111 ppm potassium last time I tested it...both of which are considered high...but I add considerable composted animal manure every year anyhow to help get that needed nitrogen. My main source of nitrogen however comes from cover crops such as Sunn Hemp which adds over 100 pounds of N2 per acre.

Cover crops are like magic....and I use them summer, fall, and winter in rotation. Never have to buy synthetic nitrogen.

 

[nao57]

I completely understand that, but again, I'm already in the excessive range on the P and K. Do I still want to add manure?

You may want to still always do steer/horse compost or whatever each year, because you are doing that to account for what minerals, nutrients you've lost. I would do this every year. It will be harder to get fertilizer next year also because of how the economy is unraveling, and g o v s are becoming more unstable. Some are getting more restrictive.

So its best to just count on putting back in some, to stay on top of it.

...

Also I'd learned a few things to share with you that might help. A lot of people think of NPK. But they should also be thinking of CARBON. The amount of carbon in the soil is huge. This is because carbon is the building block of life. Its also the chain link that holds all of this together with the NPK. All of that, N, P, K, O, etc are in carbon chains. And its easier to think about how much carbon is in the soil when looking at soil health.

And this makes perfect sense! Wood and wood chips, all that stuff have this carbon stuff in them. People also often call regenerative agriculture, 'carbon farming', for this reason of seeing that carbon is the link to all of it.

Now... in the midwest here in the states, when they had the bison running around they say the soil there was like 12 or 12.5% carbon. And they could grow anything! They'd hardly even have to try. But then people noticed that the carbon levels were dropping over the years. And now they are very low. They saw a lot of those places are now only about 2 or 3 % carbon now. And they have to use chemical fertilizers (only chemical fertilizers don't have the carbon chains in them, see... so its not the same thing). Anyway, the idea is... now that they are having all these problems with the farms is when they are trying to replace the lost nutrients with chemical substitutes. Wheras in contrast carbin is in the steer compost and other compost forms.

People who are really good at growing stuff, a lot of them swear by carbon farming/regenerative agriculture ideas. And they also say how much easier it is to do it this way.

 

[nao57]

My soil tests out 63 ppm phosphorous and 111 ppm potassium last time I tested it...both of which are considered high...but I add considerable composted animal manure every year anyhow to help get that needed nitrogen. My main source of nitrogen however comes from cover crops such as Sunn Hemp which adds over 100 pounds of N2 per acre.

Cover crops are like magic....and I use them summer, fall, and winter in rotation. Never have to buy synthetic nitrogen.

That is very cool. It might be interesting to hear more on this, and also what kind of time frames you have to hit on.

 

[Ruderunner]

I'm of the understanding that excessive P and K are really a non issue. The plants will take what they want and leave the rest.

And to expand on the carbon topic, consider that vegetables are primarily carbohydrates. Every time you pick you're removing carbon from the garden. Naturally you have to put it back somehow.