There are those who think Reams-Ag is some sort of cult or religion.
Instead, Reams-Ag is all about soil testing, testing, testing. However, I don't mean the simplistic flame photometer testing you get when you mail or ship in a sample. Reams wanted every intelligent farmer to conduct their own tests---to be their own laboratory. What he was after was for the farmer to run soils analysis that was in tune with the crops and the crops' needs.
Reams worked out the testing details with LaMotte. Key points were that the farmer needed to know calcium, potassium and phosphate quantities. Instead of the typical mining assay so commonly passed off as "soil testing," Reams demanded to know the total pounds of nutrients actually available to the plant roots. His term was Total Daily Nutrient (TDN). So LaMotte built him a test kit that could do the job right here and right now. I think the kit can be purchased from Pike AgriLab.
Reams' detractors tried to slip the word "water soluble" in to label those results so they could get the farmer thinking "water soluble" nutrients would wash away just like dissolvable salt fertilizers. Some fell for it, but the savvy realized that calcium, potassium, and phosphate could be magnetically bound into the soil so as to not go anywhere but into the plants.
The detractors loved to point out that their "soil tests" showing CEC and saturations were near perfect and they blanched---gagged---when he pointed right back that their tons of, say, calcium might---often did---have 50 pounds per acre AVAILABLE calcium. I guess he really insulted them when he said you need 2000 pounds of available calcium to even start farming.
But wait---what about the minors? Reams evidently loved foliar feeding the first day he heard of it. So foliar it was and he spent many a classroom day teaching farmers how to keep those minors and traces in the best range with foliar feeding. And then he wowed them by explaining that a really healthy high Brix plant picks up minerals from the air itself. What we call pollution, the healthy superior high Brix plant considers delicacy.
And then the fun part started. Reams understood that nitrate nitrogen triggered growth in plants while ammoniacal nitrogen created fruiting. Mainstream agriculture fifty years later has apparently still not figured that one out. Reams demanded yet more testing as the crop neared harvest. He showed his adherents that if in the few weeks remaining they kept the nitrate and ammoniacal nitrogens at 40 pounds each per acre, they could double the yield their neighbors were getting.
The farmers who attended his seminars and stayed awake changed, as Reams said, "from bank borrowers to bank owners."
Of course none of this is in the game plan of the fertilizer or pesticide makers and they are the ones who provide the grant money that keep the ag schools going. So there is slim chance any ag student will hear of it. He probably will need to farm away most of his inheritance before he figures there must be a better way and goes searching. Reams-Ag is waiting.
Rex Harrill
Instead, Reams-Ag is all about soil testing, testing, testing. However, I don't mean the simplistic flame photometer testing you get when you mail or ship in a sample. Reams wanted every intelligent farmer to conduct their own tests---to be their own laboratory. What he was after was for the farmer to run soils analysis that was in tune with the crops and the crops' needs.
Reams worked out the testing details with LaMotte. Key points were that the farmer needed to know calcium, potassium and phosphate quantities. Instead of the typical mining assay so commonly passed off as "soil testing," Reams demanded to know the total pounds of nutrients actually available to the plant roots. His term was Total Daily Nutrient (TDN). So LaMotte built him a test kit that could do the job right here and right now. I think the kit can be purchased from Pike AgriLab.
Reams' detractors tried to slip the word "water soluble" in to label those results so they could get the farmer thinking "water soluble" nutrients would wash away just like dissolvable salt fertilizers. Some fell for it, but the savvy realized that calcium, potassium, and phosphate could be magnetically bound into the soil so as to not go anywhere but into the plants.
The detractors loved to point out that their "soil tests" showing CEC and saturations were near perfect and they blanched---gagged---when he pointed right back that their tons of, say, calcium might---often did---have 50 pounds per acre AVAILABLE calcium. I guess he really insulted them when he said you need 2000 pounds of available calcium to even start farming.
But wait---what about the minors? Reams evidently loved foliar feeding the first day he heard of it. So foliar it was and he spent many a classroom day teaching farmers how to keep those minors and traces in the best range with foliar feeding. And then he wowed them by explaining that a really healthy high Brix plant picks up minerals from the air itself. What we call pollution, the healthy superior high Brix plant considers delicacy.
And then the fun part started. Reams understood that nitrate nitrogen triggered growth in plants while ammoniacal nitrogen created fruiting. Mainstream agriculture fifty years later has apparently still not figured that one out. Reams demanded yet more testing as the crop neared harvest. He showed his adherents that if in the few weeks remaining they kept the nitrate and ammoniacal nitrogens at 40 pounds each per acre, they could double the yield their neighbors were getting.
The farmers who attended his seminars and stayed awake changed, as Reams said, "from bank borrowers to bank owners."
Of course none of this is in the game plan of the fertilizer or pesticide makers and they are the ones who provide the grant money that keep the ag schools going. So there is slim chance any ag student will hear of it. He probably will need to farm away most of his inheritance before he figures there must be a better way and goes searching. Reams-Ag is waiting.
Rex Harrill
RSS Feed