You can't buy salvation in a bottle.

I've noticed recently, as the soil health movement is gaining steam from the farmer realization that soils are bad and getting worse, big companies and universities are now working on magic elixirs to fix what ails us.

It won't work.

Even if it works immediately after application and the soil is a little healthier for a time and the plants start off well, the actual problem is the long-term management. That's what has caused the decline. That's what will prevent the recovery.

Buying elixirs, therefore, will never carry you farther than the current growing season and existing soil conditions. Therefore, it will be no different than buying fertilizer.

This reminds me of people who use compost tea every year, all year long, year after year. I believe they're largely missing the point, and they're not saving money or building more resilience into their farming and grazing systems.

To reiterate: If we want to change our profit outlook on pasture or crop ground, we must do these things:

Last, we may need to help the soil-plant complex along with some of those amendments and fertility as we rebuild it into a resilient and more profitable system.