Skip to content
Tuzhi
中文Sign in

Back to the field guide

The soil isn’t ‘alive’: microbes out of balance

A bottle of inoculant is not a substitute for organic matter and air.

Same crop againThin organic matter
Speed
  1. The sheet is not low but the crop still fails — more like the soil is not alive.
  2. A microbe imbalance often rides with same-crop fatigue, but organic matter and air have to be right before any inoculant can live there.
  3. Don’t mix microbes with a sterilant; don’t toss them on baked soil; don’t skip organic matter.
  4. Bio-organic manure: Follow the registered label. Dry, baking sun, or mixed with a fungicide — it dies
  5. Name what you see before you feed.
  6. If leaves, roots and the surface disagree, stop.
  7. Microbes need a house and a meal.
  8. Compaction, acid, salt and no organic matter mean a bag cannot settle.

What you see in the field

Nutrients not low but growth poor; straw sits a year; soil smells, smears, no pores.Patchy dead plants: look at the roots first — knots, brown rot, stained pipes — not the thin white roots of hunger. A rotated neighbour that still looks well is the contrast that counts.

A sketch. Do not fertilise from the picture alone.

Tap to enlarge. The caption says what to photograph. Missing field photos are marked as to-be-added.

Why it looks like this

The field looks like this because the root cannot take water or nutrients the usual way. Fix the soil condition first — drainage, salt, acidity, compaction or a salt of fertiliser — then a thin feed. Rates live in the range on this page; confirm with a local station and the label.

Easy to mix up

  • Looks like “Just short of fertiliser”

    The sheet is not low but the crop still fails — more like the soil is not alive.

  • Looks like “Same-crop disease”

    A microbe imbalance often rides with same-crop fatigue, but organic matter and air have to be right before any inoculant can live there.

Do this / don’t do that

  1. 1Compare the worst plants with a neighbour ridge. Photograph whole plant, close-up and soil surface before you add fertiliser.
  2. 2Match roots, leaves and the soil surface to this guide. If they do not line up, do not copy a bag count.
  3. 3Use the rate range on this page only as a range. Confirm with a local station and the product label.

Don’t do this first

  • Don’t mix microbes with a sterilant; don’t toss them on baked soil; don’t skip organic matter.

Rate range

Bio-organic manure

Follow the registered label

Dry, baking sun, or mixed with a fungicide — it dies.

Organic-matter input

Keep putting it on, locally

Food for the microbes.

These are ranges. Confirm with your local extension station and the product label.

pH / organic matter / salt

Read these three first

Then nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and the micronutrients.

A field check

Which leaves, the roots, the soil surface

Compare a healthy neighbour plant.

When you see Nutrients not low but growth poor; straw sits a year; soil smells, test. Mix several spots of the tilled layer; skip the edge and the manure heap.

Lesson video

2026-03-24 · Li Zeyu · For learning. Serious damage: local agronomist or a soil test.

For learning only. Fertiliser and pesticide decisions need a local agronomist and a soil test.

Not sure? Photograph the field to identify the problem