Soil inoculation significantly increases maize yields
Published: Thursday, Nov 30th 2023, 09:40
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Inoculating the soil with a fungus can increase the maize harvest in fields by up to 40 percent. This can be achieved without additional fertilization or pesticides, as a Swiss research team shows in a new study.
"This is huge," commented co-leader of the study Marcel van der Heijden from the University of Zurich and Agroscope in a press release issued by the University of Zurich (UZH) on Thursday. It is a big step towards more sustainable agriculture.
The research team from the Universities of Zurich and Basel, the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (Fibl) and the Agroscope Research Institute inoculated 54 maize fields from Basel to St. Gallen with the mycorrhizal fungus for the study, as Heijden explained at the request of Keystone-SDA. The fungi were worked into the soil before the maize was sown.
An insurance policy
The study published in the journal "Nature Microbiology" shows that yields increased by 40 percent on a quarter of the trial plots. However, the fungal inoculation did not work equally well on all areas: on a third of the fields, there was no increase in yield or even a decrease in yield, according to the UZH.
In the study, the researchers were able to show that fungal inoculation works well where many fungal pathogens were already present in the soil. As a result of the inoculation, the normal high yield was maintained, while crop losses would have occurred without mycorrhizal fungi. "So they act as a kind of insurance," said Heijden. In contrast, mycorrhizal fungi have only a minor effect on fields that are not contaminated with pathogens.
The researchers derived a prediction method from these findings - and were thus able to predict the success of a vaccination in nine out of ten fields. According to the researchers, this predictability allows the fungi to be used specifically in fields where they work.
©Keystone/SDA
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