Oliver Moore: Zach Wright’s course on enhancing soil

Do you remember when birds used to flock around the back of the plough? Ploughing meant a guaranteed supply of worms and other edibles, so birds swooped and swooshed towards their food behind the moving tractors.

Anyone at the Ploughing this year will know that this is now a rare occurrence indeed. Increasingly, we know more of the importance of soil, of microbiota and of the complicated world beneath our feet. And yet, the more we know, the more we know that there is an awful lot more to know.

We also know that soil is being lost, and is losing its essential character through intensive practices, from mineral fertilisation and the icide family (pest, herb, fungicides), to compaction and ploughing itself.