Understand the biology and nutrition of your soil for better crops and lower costs
Easily see potential deficiencies, plant pathogen risks or missing elements of a healthy soil before planting or manage the health of your crop during the growing season.
Who is it for?
- Arable farmer performing sap testing on his wheat, barley or OSR to react to deficiencies early.
- Pasture farmer doing a Haney test to see if her regenerative practices are working.
- Market Gardener doing nutritional analysis in order to grow healthy food.
- Carbon farming project using DNA to map the microbial community and its functions
- Compost producer checking if it has developed a healthy and productive soil food web community
What tests do we offer?
- Soil Food Web microscopy assay – see if your soil has acceptable levels of the four main groups of soil microorganisms or if there are gaps which prevent you from benefiting from the full functionality of your soil.
- Nutritional analysis – exchangeable and soluble pools of nutrients. Gives you the balance of all the relevant cations and anions plus which make it to the soluble pool.
- Haney test – the latest technology which informs the actual pool of nutrients available to plants based on the signals they send out to the soil.
- Sap analysis – what nutrients are in the plant sap, which are not getting to new growth in time before the plant robs them from the old ones.
- Functional DNA analysis for farmers and growers. Not just simple lists of microbes, but a cross section of how well they deal with nutrient delivery, what pathogen risks are present for your crop, the levels of hormone production and climate adaptability.
View example reports from each testing method below
Soil Food Web Microscopy Assay
Nutritional Analysis
Haney Test
Sap Analysis
Functional DNA Analysis
Why these tests?
- Know if you have a functioning soil food web present and which elements are missing and not providing functions to your crop.
- Know if your plants will have recurring access to key nutrients with the nutritional analysis.
- See if the plants are working together with the microbiome to receive nitrogen and other key nutrients with the Haney test.
- Get warned about pathogen risks before the season begins through the comprehensive DNA analysis. See if your crop will be supported during unfavourable weather conditions.
- Finally see directly the effects of your work and that of your soil in the plant sap – and catch deficiencies early.
How to collect and send in samples
Follow the sampling procedure below and include the submission worksheet with your sample.
Sampling Procedure
Follow the step-by-step instructions for collecting, packaging and sending your samples correctly.
Submission Worksheet
Download and complete the worksheet to include with your sample submission.
Value
Microscopy
£70 plus VAT
Value – the presence of protozoa and nematodes ensures efficient nutrient cycling from organic matter or parent soil. The presence of fungi moderates many nutrient imbalances and provides nutrient cycling.
Nutritional analysis with Logan Labs
£70 plus shipping to US at cost plus VAT
Know the balance of the plant available nutrients in the soil and their total availability. See the range of cations and even anions that is hard to get for this cost here in the UK. This test is closely correlated with the sap analysis, and doing this before the growing season starts, gives you a heads up of any deficiencies you may encounter later.
Haney test with Regen Ag Labs
£70 plus shipping to US at cost plus VAT
You may be using more synthetic fertiliser than you need. This test shows what is the biologically available nitrogen currently in your soil.
Sap analysis
£25 per test or £50 per pair
Although you need to send in samples to NovaCrop on your own, you will receive detailed instructions on how to prepare samples, sample bags, cold packs, etc in order to make your sample preparation as efficient as possible. The results will allow you to quickly amend your nutrition programme on the fly because you will spot deficiencies early.
DNA functional analysis
£233 plus shipping to Spain and VAT
This shows you not just the community of microbes in your soil down to the genus and often to species level, but also what functions they can perform. Critically, it can also show you the level of risk associated with your crop specific pathogens currently living in your soil.