About Balancing Microbes
Balancing Microbes and Lisa Price
Balancing Microbes grew out of a desire to increase the nutrition, flavour and freshness of food.
North Queensland’s Soil Food Web Lab
Started by Lisa Price, the Balancing Microbes Soil Food Web Lab gives everyone the opportunity to have their soil analysed to identify the bacteria, protozoa, nematodes, and fungi in their soil. This will pinpoint what is needed to bring the soil back into balance for growing healthy, nutritious plants.
Lisa is passionate about growing food, and learning how plants grow. She has always loved growing things. Being fascinated with how to get the best possible yield from the garden led her to investigate the soil biology – and the Balancing Microbes Soil Food Web Lab.
Lisa found that living remotely, there was a limited supply of fresh fruit and vegetables. The choice was to either buy from the supermarkets, grow your own food, or travel long distances every weekend to access the farmer’s markets. She found that living in a small rural community creates a challenge for people who are seeking nutritious, fresh food.
Finding Answers For Growing Healthy, Nutritious Food
“In nature, no one fertilises, so why have we developed a massive industry to fertilise our food?”
This question fueled my journey to find better ways to grow food. After raising my large family, I began looking for answers. I started growing biodynamic/organic seedlings for the home gardener and planting out what didn’t sell.
This grew into our biodynamic market garden, and selling veggies and seedlings to our local community and surrounding area. We had to create our own way of marketing our produce because of our remote locality.
When I started the seedlings & market garden, at first I tried growing with just potting mix, but the seedlings looked awful – they were not happy at all! So, I did some research, and this led me to Dr. Elaine Ingham and the Soil Food Web. I began studying and it answered all my questions and many more. Using the soil biology to make minerals available to the plants was my missing link.
Creating beautiful compost soil for the seedlings became our signature solution for robust, healthy young plants.
Soil Food Web in Queensland
Studying the soil food web and learning how to grow plants without using any chemical fertilisers or any chemical inputs was my objective. After all, if nature can do it without chemicals – why can’t we?
Balancing the soil biology was my “ah-ha” moment – the answer to why we are not getting complete nutrition in our food.
The goal of the Soil Testing Lab here at Balancing Microbes is to share my knowledge and allow people to have an understanding of what the biology of their soil is. This knowledge that I have learned about the soil food web can transform the soil, what we are able to grow, and the goodness of the food we eat. I wanted to make this accessible to everyone – from local gardeners to the farming community.
Continuing my studies, I will soon be qualified as a Soil Food Web Consultant – which means I will be available for advising on how to fix the biology of the soil by bringing it back into balance.
Balancing Microbes is a Certified Soil Food Web Lab
I love growing plants! I love buying in seed and seeing what grows from that tiny thing – it’s like magic to me!! From this tiny little seed, to a complete plant…. with all the successes and failures that go along with it.