Eco-balance
Colin Austin © 10 April 2024 This document is published under the Creative Commons system which means that it can be copied and republished without further permissions but the author Colin Austin @ gbiota.com must be recognised.
Humans are not naturally fat
Humans have evolved to be naturally not fat – it is not good in the survival stakes. Our bodies naturally sense when we are full and our gut manufactures hormones which make us feel full and stop eating.
So-called obesity drugs, like Ozempic, are humans attempt to simulate the actions of our natural hormones.
But modern food is deficient in both certain trace minerals and more importantly the microbes that form our gut-brain.
Gbiota shows how to grow gut-brain food so we produce those hormones naturally.
The wrong fat in the wrong place is the underlying cause of the modern epidemic of chronic diseases, diabetes, heart attacks and dementia.
Breeding microbes is easy
Breeding microbes in the soil is easy – they don’t need any help – they do it all by themselves.
The snag is there are beneficial microbes, the goodies, that will keep us fit and healthy so we can expect a long and healthy life but there are also harmful microbes, the badies, which can make us sick and even kill us.
So the challenge is how to breed the goodies without breeding the badies.
You may have noticed that you don’t get many mangrove trees growing in the desert or many cacti growing in the hot tropics – and if you try you won’t have much luck.
Living things will automatically select conditions which suit them, that is what we call Eco-balance and is the basis of the Gbiota technology.
We just have to work out the conditions that favour both the goodies and the badies will thrive in, then create the conditions that favour the goodies.
Food, Water and air
Food, water, and air are the dominant factors. In general, the beneficial microbes prefer moist, not wet, conditions with plenty of air while the harmful microbes breed in wet, or totally saturated conditions.
But making the soil moist is not that simple. Water tends to cling to soil particles and not move through the soil – one area can be nearly saturated while other areas close by are still dry.
How to achieve a more uniformly moist soil, without being too wet, is a key part of the Gbiota technology which I will talk about later, but let me first talk about a topic with a delightful name.
The cocktail effect
When thinking about Ecosystems we have to look at how the entire system works, and not just individual components of the system.
Plants, soil creatures, and microbes have a very close and complex relationship. Living plants create sugars as part of the photosynthesis process which they exude from their roots to attract and feed specific breeds of microbes and fungi.
Fungi
These microbes and fungi are far more efficient at collecting minerals from the soil. Fungi, in particular, will exude enzymes which they force into rocks so the minerals become bio-available and feed the plants.
Plants also die and there is a whole range of creatures which recycle this organic waste. Worms and ants are the most common but there are many recyclers, some visible, some microscopic which will feed on this organic matter.
Some have teeth and can bite into the organic waste, while others have gizzards to grind them up but they all have a gut, just like us, which is part of the digestion process. These are important for our gut health.
But we have to think about the system as a whole. We could waste a ton of money on mycorrhizal inoculants which simply die if there are no plants to form that symbiotic relationship.
Or we could simply plant some sunflowers which form a very strong relationship with mycorrhizal fungi it just takes a few fungi to be in the soil and they will rapidly breed up with the help of the Sunflowers – all for free.
Companion plants
Plants also have symbiotic relationships with other species. Anyone who has tried to grow broccoli will know that the flies, and their maggots love broccoli. It is pretty much a losing battle.
I don’t use toxic chemicals as I do not want to kill off the microbes I am trying to breed so I have an ongoing battle with netting to keep the flies off my plants.
If I have a whole box devoted to broccoli this can be a losing battle, so I often use a seed mix with maybe twenty or so varieties of seeds.
Some will be resistant to flies so at the very worst I will end up with some crop, but even better some plants when attacked by flies produce chemicals to fend off the flies and in the process will provide some protection for my broccoli.
Water and soil blood
People who write about how water moves through the soil (and that includes me) will use the word water.
But that is not correct. If we are interested in how food is produced we must think about what happens on the surface of the soil particles – this is where the action starts.
Generally, water is attracted to the soil particle surface although there are some soils which are hydrophobic, meaning they repel water.
These are often soils under gum trees. In the weird logic of EcoSystems, gum trees survive fires by having leaves full of oil which deprive the air of oxygen so there may be a monster fire but the trees themselves survive.
How many humans would have thought of the idea that to protect trees from fires fill the leaves with oil – not many I think. One up to nature.
But in normal soils, the chemical, physical, and biological action is on the surface of the soil particles.
Certainly, water is attracted to the soil particle surface but it is not simply water, it is a complex combination of water, chemical and microbiology.
This is transferred through the soil to feed the plants, in the same way that blood circulates around our bodies distributing food and complex chemicals to all parts of our bodies.
I call this soil blood so when I am talking about water moving through the soil I am talking about how soil blood moves through the soil.
I have written an article on how water moves through the soil which you can read here
Water stays put
But the key point is that water (actually soil blood) does not readily move through the soil but will cling, by surface tension, to the soil particles and will only move when wet with water in the larger cavities, less bound to the soil, and so can readily move.
Even with drip tape, which is supposed to be the wonder solution to irrigation, the soil has to reach saturation (actually over field capacity) to move.
To breed our beneficial microbes we need the soil to be uniformly moist. We could work out the precise amount of water we need to make the soil moist and apply just the right amount but we will end up with some soil too wet while the rest is too dry.
It is not distributed uniformly throughout the soil
I use the word soil, but really it is soil loaded with a very high level of organic waste that we are using to breed the beneficial microbes. If we leave this soil-waste mix saturated for any length of time we will breed the harmful microbes.
This is the problem we have to solve. At least we know what not to do.
What not to do!!!!!
We must not keep on topping up the soil with water, that will just mean that some areas are continuously too wet while other areas are too dry. Nobody wins.
What to do!!!!
Seeding
If you are seeding the entire box then don’t flood the whole box. Different seeds have different requirements, some must be saturated before they germinate others germinate with just a bit of moisture so just apply to suit the variety.
Very little water is used when seeding so be careful not to flood as this will leave stagnant water in the base of the box, which is where you would normally put the organic waste (until the worms do their thing).
I prefer to have some plants growing so typically will have some water-hungry plants like spinach growing in the corner of the boxes.
Regular watering
When the plants have developed a root and leaf structure there will be a transpirational load on the system eg it will be using water so we can start using the proper Wicking or Gbiota irrigation protocols.
Most people have a habit of going out to their garden and if looks a bit dry then apply a bit of water. This is not the way to operate a Wicking or Gbiota box.
These need to operate in a different way. Instead of applying different amounts of water with a fixed irrigation schedule, we let the box semi-dry out and then apply a fixed amount of water.
This is why I recommend having a vertical filler pipe so you can see the water level, when there is no liquid water it is time to irrigate.
Typically we will apply about 15% of the soil volume. 20litres is a good size for a Gbiota box as then they can be lifted and moved about so we need to apply 3 litres of water.
With great foresight, the dairy industry anticipated a demand for three litre bottles and introduced them to keep all the Gbiota growers happy. (Actually, that’s me just being silly but it would be a miserable world without a bit of fun.)
Step 1 If you have not already drained the box turn the swivel tube down and catch and soil blood in the bottle.
Step 2 Turn the swivel pipe upwards and pour the water into the box. If you have been operating for a while the water caught in the milk bottle will be genuine soil blood with a deep brown colour. This is full of nutrients and a wide selection of living creatures.
I like to start by pouring some of the water over the plants so the leaves absorb some of the nutrients and biota.
The rest I will pour into the compost tube.
Step 3 Check the water level, if it has not reached the top of the swivel tube (which should be about 1/3 of the height of the box) add more water.
Step 4 Wait until the water has all been used up. If it has not been used after a week then twist the swivel tube down and drain the box and start over again.
Labile compost
Organic matter that has not been properly composted is called labile (young) compost and may be full of growth inhibitors and is certainly not good for growing plants.
Hot composting is the standard solution, but requires careful control of the carbon-to-nitrogen ratio and ensuring that quality of the organic material. I will try and pre-compost my organic waste if I can but it does not breed the microbes that our guts need.
The Gbiota method is to cold compost by burying and allowing the creatures of the soil to process the organic waste in their guts which will breed the right type of microbes.
The organic waste is buried, covered with mature soil and planted so the plants exude nutrients to feed the microbes.
This is easy to do in Gbiota beds and can be done by putting a lid on the box, flipping over, filling the base with organic waste then flipping the soil on the lid back onto the box.
Just pretend you are making pancakes.
Compost tubes
Perhaps a more practical way is to use compost tubes, this is great if you have boxes on the patio which are too heavy to flip.
Make up a box full of nutrients (eg chicken manure, rock dust and dolomite).
Make a compost tube (any tube about 100mm in diameter) by cutting at about 45% on one end and flat at the other.
Find a suitable lid like a yoghurt container.
Just dig a hole and insert the compost tube into the hole.
As you generate kitchen waste just fill the tube and add some of the nutrient mix and worms if there is none in the box and unless you have a particular affection for flies seal with the yoghurt container (or whatever).
Keep on doing this until the level in the compost tube is at soil level, pull out the tube while pushing the compost mix into the soil.
Dig another hole somewhere else, and use the soil to cover the old hole and seed.
This is a simple way of getting the labile compost to the base of the box while having plants growing on top.
Irrigating
If the swivel tube is up twist down and allow to drain. (I normally have the swivel tube in the downward drain position after I have irrigated).
When you are irrigating first give the foliage a flush, pour any excess soil blood into the compost tube and if there is excess into the filler tube.
Add additional water (if needed) so liquid reaches the top of the swivel tube.
Allow a period (at least an hour but not more than a day) for the soil blood to wick throughout the bed.
Twist the swivel tube to allow the box to drain catching the soil blood (which should be dark brown) into your recycled milk bottle (or whatever).
In my subtropical climate of Bundaberg, I do this once a week.
There is more than enough liquid to last at least a week in my hot dry climate but I still make this a weekly routine when I am at home because I like to flush, but there is more than enough water to last longer so if I am on a trip I don’t worry.
Flood drain and recycle
Flooding expels the stale air and draining suck is fresh air into the soil.
The cycling ensures the soil blood is never stagnant.
These are the two basic rules of the Gbiota system.
