Improving soil quality by conserving insect pathogens
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2013-01-01
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Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture
The Leopold Center is a research and education center on the campus of Iowa State University created to identify and reduce negative environmental and social impacts of farming and develop new ways to farm profitably while conserving natural resources.
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Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture
Abstract
This study found that organic fields had a greater abundance of naturally occurring entomopathogenic fungi (EPF) than conventional fields in 2011, but that no differences were present in 2012. Conventional producers who used organic fertilizers on their fields had greater abundance of one type of EPF, Metarhizium, in their farm soils than other conventional producers. This suggests that organic practices in corn and soybean fields, and the application of organic fertilizers in conventional fields, could bolster the abundance of naturally occurring EPF.