We have chemicals in our
everyday lives everywhere. Shampoo, toothpaste, many foods, even our clothing
all contain or are manufactured with the use of chemicals. Besides polluting
the environment, the use of chemicals can be much more threatening. But we’re
concentrating on gardening and the use of these chemicals on our food. One of
the prominent ways chemicals are used in food production is through chemical
fertilizers. Chemical fertilizers are quick-acting, short-term plant boosters
and are responsible for:
1. Deterioration of soil
friability creating hardpans soil
2. Destruction of beneficial
soil life, including earthworms
3. Altering vitamin and protein
content of certain crops
4. Making certain crops more
vulnerable to diseases
5. Preventing plants from
absorbing some needed minerals.
The soil must be regarded as a
living organism. An acid fertilizer, because of its acids, dissolves the
cementing material, made up of the dead bodies of soil organisms, which holds
the rock particles together in the form of soil crumbs. This compact surface
layer of rock particles encourages rain water to run off rather than enter the
soil. For example, a highly soluble fertilizer, such as 5-10-5, goes into
solution in the soil water rapidly so that much of it may be leached away into our
ground water without benefiting the plants at all. This chemical causes the
soil to assume a cement-like hardness. When present in large concentrations,
they seep into the subsoil where they interact with the clay to form impervious
layers of precipitates called hardpan. Many artificial chemical fertilizers
contain acids, as sulfuric and hydrochloric, which will increase the acidity of
the soil. Changes in the soil acidity (pH) are accompanied by the changes in
the kinds of organisms which can live in the soil. For this reason, the
artificial fertilizer people tell their customers to increase the organic
matter content of their soil or use lime to offset the effects of these acids.
There are several ways by which
artificial fertilizers reduce aeration of soils. Earthworms, whose numerous borings
made the soil more porous, are killed. The acid fertilizers will also destroy
the cementing material which bins rock particles together in crumbs. Chemical
fertilizers rob plants of some natural immunity by killing off the micro
organisms in the soil.
Many plant diseases have
already been considerably checked when antibiotic producing bacteria or fungi
thrived around the roots. When plants are supplied with much nitrogen and only
a medium amount of phosphate, plants will most easily contract mosaic
infections. Host resistance is obtained if there is a small amount of nitrogen
and a large supply of phosphate. Fungus and bacterial diseases have been
related to high nitrogen fertilization, and lack of trace elements.
Plants grown with artificial
chemical fertilizers tend to have less nutrient value than organically grown
plants. For example, several tests have found that by supplying citrus fruits
with a large amount of soluble nitrogen will lower the vitamin C content of
oranges. It has also been found, that these fertilizers that provide soluble
nitrogen will lower the capacity of corn to produce high protein content. Probably
the most regularly observed deficiency in plants treated continually with
chemical fertilizers is deficiencies in trace minerals. To explain this
principle will mean delving into a little physics and chemistry, but you will then
easily see the unbalanced nutrition created in chemical fertilized plants.
The colloidal humus particles
are the convoys that transfer most of the minerals from the soil solution to
the root hairs. Each humus particle is negatively charged and will, attract the
positive elements, such as potassium, sodium, calcium, magnesium, manganese,
aluminum, boron, iron, copper and other metals. When sodium nitrate is dumped
into the soil year after year, in large doses, a radical change takes place on
the humus articles. The very numerous sodium ions (atomic particles) will eventually
crowd out the other ions, making them practically unavailable for plant use.
The humus becomes coated with sodium, glutting the root hairs with the excess.
Finally, the plant is unable to pick up the minerals that it really needs.
So, with chemical fertilizers,
in short, you have short-time results, and long-term damage to the soil, ground water
and to our health. Another reason to avoid the use of chemicals and pesticides
is that long term use of such chemicals can deplete the soil and leave it
unable to sustain further growth. In many cases beds of perennials suddenly
stop blooming for no apparent reason, and the culprit is often found to be the
overuse of chemical fertilizers, herbicides and pesticides.
Chemicals that are applied to
plants can often seep into the water supply thus contaminating it. While it’s
true, our drinking water does go through a filtration process, it’s been proven
that this process doesn’t remove ALL of the harmful contaminants.
It has also been proven that
certain chemicals can cause diseases, birth defects, and other hazardous health
problems. All one needs to do is watch the movie “Erin Brokovich” to see what
chemical contamination of water can do to a body.
Consumers worry about filthy
slaughterhouses, e-coli, salmonella and fecal contamination. The CDC estimates
that 76 million American suffer food poisoning every year. There are no
documented cases of organic meat, poultry or dairy products setting off a food
poisoning outbreak in the United States. Consumers are also
concerned about toxic sewage used as fertilizer on conventional farms. Organic
farming prohibits the use of sewage sludge.
They worry about untested and
unlabelled genetically engineered food ingredients in common supermarket items.
Genetically engineered ingredients are now found in 60 percent to 75 percent of
all U.S. foods. Although polls indicate 90 percent of Americans want labels on
genealtered foods, government and industry
refuse to label. Organic production forbids
genetic engineering. Eating organic eliminates, or minimizes, the risk from poisoning
from heavy metals found in sewage sludge, the unknowns of genetically modified
food, the ingestion of hormone residues, and the exposure to mutant bacteria strains.
It also reduces the exposure to insecticide and fungicide residues.
Residues from potentially
carcinogenic pesticides are left behind on some of our favorite fruits and
vegetables – in 1998, the FDA found pesticide residues in over 35 percent of the
food tested. Many U.S. products have tested as being more toxic than those from
other countries. What's worse is that current standards for
pesticides in food do not yet include specific protection for fetuses, infants,
or young children despite major changes to federal pesticide laws in 1996
requiring such reforms. It is certainly in the best
interests of the human population to avoid chemicals in our food, but it’s also
better for our planet as well. Chemicals can affect the soil making it less
fertile. They destroy important parts of the natural eco-system. All plants and
animals serve some sort of purpose – even if that purpose isn’t especially
obvious. By taking these components out of the natural life cycle, we are endangering
our environment in ways we can’t necessarily see outright, but that danger is
there. So it becomes obvious that growing your food naturally is the best way
to go. Let’s take a moment and look at what exactly organic gardening is.
No comments:
Post a comment