Better soils with Brett Petersen Kiwi Fertiliser & Golden Bay Dolomite

There’s been recent press  about the combined cost  of damage caused by insects. An AgResearch study  estimates $2.3 billion worth of damage to New Zealand’s pastures annually.

The major players are black beetle, grass grub, porina, argentine stem weevil and clover root weevil on pasture. Other crops also suffer.

How many other $2.3 billion-dollar problems do we have in NZ by following institutional – including consultants – advice? This question is not limited to insect damage.

As a client of the fertiliser co-operatives, you’ll be having avoidable problems brought about by unbalanced fertiliser regimes. The system you work under is a self-serving and input-driven. Farmers are advised to apply an unbalanced fertiliser to an unbalanced soil to help sustain a state of imbalance, which will then require constant chemical intervention. So it is with insect pests.

If you create the ideal conditions for them, they will thrive, and you will have to fight back. But you will only be fighting symptoms of sub-optimal soil and suboptimal plants. It is far more profitable to properly fertilise the soil in the  first place.

Simply put, use fertiliser to discourage insects, not to encourage them.

AgResearch senior  scientist Pip Gerard is on the right track to some degree with her comments about flooding and free-draining and lime.

AgResearch has not encouraged its employees to think outside of the system that applies lime to change pH. Because pH is the result of a fertiliser programme and should not be the cause of it.

If you balance the soil correctly, the pH you have will be the right one. Generally, it will be around 6.4. Certainly not in the fives. If we had been asked our opinion about liming three years ago, AgResearch would have most of their answers by now. Whether you get insect infestations, or just correctly balanced populations of many insect types, comes down to the health of the soil.

The key to returning a soil to good health is also the key to whether that soil is sick and suitable habitat for insects or weeds. That involves calcium and magnesium percentages – not ratios: you’ll never get anywhere with ratios. Some soil chemists have tried but of course, all failed miserably.

It may also involve the relationship between nitrogen and potassium. The soil is a whole collection of living entities. It can grow, or it can be killed. What sort of soil do you want? One that costs $440-$660 per hectare in insect damage? That is an AgResearch 2018 estimate for Waikato dairy farms. That alone would buy a lot of the correct fertiliser. In a few years you wouldn’t have insect plagues, nor facial  eczema. We can’t say when it will happen, as that depends on where  the soil is now and your willingness to follow a  programme. But it will happen.

I used to run dairy farms on the same principles outlined above and although our neighbours had insect problems, our farms didn’t. We have applied substances to crops that increase the sugar levels. Corn ear worm just died from eating the silk. The sugars ferment in the stomach and kill the caterpillars. With brassica crops, white butterfly will be attracted – but the healthier the crop, the fewer the number of eggs laid. There are many more examples, with lucerne featuring in a major way.

Research has shown by changing management practices, insect numbers can be reduced by 10 times when compared with practices that include using expensive, treated seed and unbalanced fertilisers.

Dr Linus Pauling, winner of two Nobel Prizes, stated: “In my opinion, one can trace every sickness, every disease and every ailment to mineral deficiency”. This statement includes insect pests.