Essays on Soil Organic Matter

Considering the effects of cover crop and intercropping on garden settings

1. Introduction 1.1 Background Sustainable agricultural production systems, otherwise known as agroecosystems, employ a variety of techniques to maintain environmental quality. Cover crops are one strategy used by growers to preserve and enhance soil resources because of their impacts on soil-nutrient dynamics (such as nitrogen and carbon fixation)and microbiological functions (Steenworth and Belina, 2008). Cover crops such as cereal grass, hairy vetch, and oilseed radish, manage problems in an agroecosystem such as soil quality, erosion and fertility, water quality, pests and weeds because they tend to be less resource intensive than other crops and instead contribute to ...

REPORT: Landscape Planning and Ecological Management: Plantation of bare root common trees.

Introduction We often take trees and other flora, all around us, for granted maybe because almost all of us have seen trees and captured the word and their image deep inside our sub-consciousness. As we grow up, we learn about the benefits and advantages of trees parrot-fashion. No person or entity teaches us anything about the aesthetics so when we see captivating landscape photographs and images, we take in the beauty without taking in the trees. It is beyond this point that most of us change directions and go off towards modern, fast-process systems, which we then proceed ...