Skip to main content

Why We Need Phosphorus!!

Here's a lesson on why we need phosphorus available to our plants.  
 
Phosphorus is easily tied up in the soil chemistry by a concretion effect when acids come into contact with alkaline substances in the soil.  For example, Phosphorus is often sold in the agriculture business or the retail nursery trade as an acidified product where the phosphorus rock called Apatite is ground up into a powder and then  treated with Phosphoric acid to make a product called Triple Super Phosphate or a water soluble phosphorus fertilizer.   However the problem is that once this acidified phosphorus hits the soils chemistry the buffering capacity of the soil rapidly turns it into a insoluble salt. 
 
Here's our dilemma.   Plants and all life need Phosphorus as its a main ingredient for making energy.  The energy will be in the form of a high energy molecule called ATP (adenosine triphosphate ) which is made in the mitochondria of the cell in a cycle called Krebs cycle or the Citric Acid cycle.  I've attached a simplified chart of this process.  If a plant is trying to make a seed, a fruit, or more biomass it needs energy and that energy comes in the form of ATP, therefore we need Phosphorus to get that done.   For example, we often hear from the Cannabis growers that they want Phosphorus during the budding stage of the plant and the reason, energy is needed.
 
On another note, we humans also need ATP, so if you take a Statin drug to try and lower your blood Cholesterol, you will contraindicate your energy cycle to make ATP, which will lead to Heart Failure, as your heart is a high energy demanding muscle.   I've attached a chart to show that metabolic pathway exemplifying the point of where the inhibiting effect of the Statin drug gets in the way of the process of making the reduced form of Co Enzyme Q10 called Ubiquinol, a key enzyme in the ATP production cycle.    
 
Michael Martin Meléndrez
Managing Member of Soil Secrets LLC
 
www.soilsecrets.com 

Popular posts from this blog

Soil Health: Level 2 - Description of Terms (Carbon Compounds)

The  Labile Carbon  is also known as the 'Rapid Cycling Carbon' and its composed of all the Soil Organic Matter that is dead and actively decomposing.  It's benefit to the soil is that it provides a source for minerals that are being recycled as potential plant nutrients, so in a sense it's Nature's fertilizer.  Active Carbon   also known as Reactive Carbon is more complex than the Labile Carbon in that its composed of all the dead and actively decomposing organic matter plus all the living soil microbial community that will eventually die and begin decomposing.   For example, the hyphae of mycorrhizae only live about 5 to 7 days before they die and start to decompose, while the fungus organism itself may live far longer.  Recalcitrant Carbons   are the Humic substances made up of complex organic chemistry, some of which is inert and some of which is very reactive and are powerful biologics, such as the Humic Acids.  Recalcitran...

Fertilizers formulated for alkaline soils of the Southwest

Recently I was in an Albuquerque retail nursery where a fertilizer was being sold that stated it was formulated for alkaline soils of the Southwest.  It contained high levels of iron and sulfur, plus the N, P and K major nutrients.  Do any of the readers care to comment on this type of product?    Pros, Cons, etc.  I have my take on it, but I'll entertain what you want to say about it.  Michael Martin Meléndrez

How does nitrogen work in the soil and where does it come from when we don't have a bag of fertilizer to supplement it?

I've spoken many times on this subject at conferences and it was the main theme of my talk when I represented North America at the World's 1st Humus Experts Meeting in Vienna Austria back in 2013.   Most of the Nitrogen used by the vast tropical rain forests, or the fastest growing biomass place on Earth, the Coastal Redwood Forests of California, comes from the production of protein by the Free-Living Nitrogen Fixing bacteria in soil and the massive biomass structure of the mycorrhizal fungi.    The proteins as it breaks down in the soil into amino acids are the building blocks of life and the explanation of the Soil Food Web.  However, in order for those amino acids to enter a plant and be part of the nitrogen budget of the plant they must have the assistance of the mycorrhizal fungi.  It's much more efficient for a plant to uptake amino acids whose molecules include nitrogen needed to build tissues than to uptake just nitrogen minus the amino acid. ...