OK, this was at the end of chapter 2, but I think it best fits with our recent discussion. It talks about the discharge of hydrogen and hydroxy from the plants roots in exchange for nutrients from the soil. It mentioned how these discharges raise and lower the pH of the soil.
However, at the end, it stated that the real reason to know about the chemistry behind the soil's pH was to understand how it affected the microbes.
Hence, this book illustrates how complex the soil food web is. The microbes affect the pH, but the pH also affects the microbes.
HG and Apps, I like your analogies.
The end if this chapter kind of sums up what HG's always trying to tell us: "You have to appreciate the soil first."
However, at the end, it stated that the real reason to know about the chemistry behind the soil's pH was to understand how it affected the microbes.
Hence, this book illustrates how complex the soil food web is. The microbes affect the pH, but the pH also affects the microbes.
HG and Apps, I like your analogies.
The end if this chapter kind of sums up what HG's always trying to tell us: "You have to appreciate the soil first."
I am way late to the party here, but I just received my copy of Teaming a couple of days ago. I am bouncing back and forth between Teaming and Eliot Coleman's the New Organic Grower ... what awesome readings for the organic gardener !!!
One thing that I have come to realize is that, in the past, I have "disturbed" the soil much more than is necessary. The damage that a roto-tiller can do to the soil (and it's living organisms) now seems so obvious to me; but it often takes a good read (like those mentioned above) to help you see things in a new light.
It's so nice to be able to read a chapter in the book, and then see others' comments and interpretations of the subject... another superb offering here at HG !!!
One thing that I have come to realize is that, in the past, I have "disturbed" the soil much more than is necessary. The damage that a roto-tiller can do to the soil (and it's living organisms) now seems so obvious to me; but it often takes a good read (like those mentioned above) to help you see things in a new light.
It's so nice to be able to read a chapter in the book, and then see others' comments and interpretations of the subject... another superb offering here at HG !!!
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The Helpful Gardener
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Nature's Babe
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Reading all your posts my thoughts were the soil foodweb is really just the initial growth bit or foundation of the whole of the web of life, and as a part of the whole, which we are a part of, we are both dependent and interdependent with it. We are indeed One. Then my thought flew to the
way we are one whole person but composed of so many individual cells all different performing different functions. Earth is a whole organism and we and other species are equivalent to different cells performing different functions within the whole living organism of earth. Fungi were the vanguard species enabling plant life to develop, who knows we might take the soil web basics to a similar rocky planet and create life on it. The fungal web is like earths internet, and dark matter is similar in structure to fungi in the earth
Intuitively somehow it begins to feel like organisms progressing in size and complexity like russian dolls
It's late and I'm rambling way off the subject of gardening.... well maybe gardening on another planet.
way we are one whole person but composed of so many individual cells all different performing different functions. Earth is a whole organism and we and other species are equivalent to different cells performing different functions within the whole living organism of earth. Fungi were the vanguard species enabling plant life to develop, who knows we might take the soil web basics to a similar rocky planet and create life on it. The fungal web is like earths internet, and dark matter is similar in structure to fungi in the earth
Intuitively somehow it begins to feel like organisms progressing in size and complexity like russian dolls
It's late and I'm rambling way off the subject of gardening.... well maybe gardening on another planet. 
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