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INVESTIGATING THE IMPACT OF MULCHING ON SOILS

Country:Kenya
Student(s):KHUSHI AGGARWAL, DARREN AMORE, KHAIROON RIDHWAN and, CELESTINE CLAUDE
Grade Level:Secondary School (grades 9-12, ages 14-18)
GLOBE Educator(s):HENRY MOGERE MOSETI
Contributors:DORCAS NEEMA and BENARD MABELE
Report Type(s):International Virtual Science Symposium Report
Protocols:(Protocol Deactivated), Soil pH, Soil Temperature
Presentation Poster: View Document
Language(s):English
Date Submitted:03/11/2023
Started in China as early as 500 BC, mulching can be seen as an early agricultural technique, used widely in many different societies/communities as means of regulating the soil's temperature, retaining soil moisture, and providing the soil with minerals/nutrients as a result of neutral alkaline pH. The investigation of mulch on soils is deeply rooted in scientific and agricultural aims that underscore the agriculture bundle and its protocols. Ethically, mulching has become an agricultural technique used by many arid area farmers, because of its ability to protect the soil of the plantation, in result decreasing the rate of soil erosion and the overall rate of evaporation from the soil (which can be most advantageous for a farmer who cannot rely on heavy rainfall to occur during their period of harvesting and growing their crops). Moreover, mulching can be seen as a more 'natural’ substitute to using expensive, artificial chemical fertilisers or pesticides on a plantation that a farmer might want to sell as ‘organic’ and ‘healthy’. The reason for this occurrence is that mulch has properties that can provide for a plantation and give it a healthier environment to grow in, than using chemical fertilisers that can leave a plant looking diminished or deficient. Our studies imply that using mulch on plantations increases their efficiency and creates a conducive space for them to be able to flourish healthily. Samples of pH, moisture level, light intensity, and temperature were obtained from our study site, the school farm, over a period of a month. We used half of the kale patch for the measurements and the other half was our control experiment. Through this study, we aimed to completely prove that mulching is a safer, cost-effective, and cleaner alternative when it comes to increasing plant productivity.



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