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Copper

Essential Trace Element
Copper is an important trace element for man, animal and plant. If a plant does not absorb enough copper, then the consumer of that plant will also not get enough copper. Copper is desired mostly by: oats, wheat, rice, barley, onion, spinach, citrus, lettuce and carrots. For grass a sufficient amount of copper is required for roughage and for the health of cattle (among others not easily being in-calf).

Two types
Our lab determines the two types of plant available copper in soil samples. One is the very easy absorbable copper, and the other type of copper analysis is the copper that can be absorbed by plants in the soil by force of exudates, that are fluids produced by the plants. Not every plant is absorbing copper and other elements with the same efficiency. Every plant has its own set of exudates. There are more methods of analysing Copper. The method “Cu-HNO3 0,43n” is analysing 70 to 98 % of the total Copper in the soil. However: the most part of the total amount of copper is not available for plants at all. That’s why we analyse only that part of the copper content of a soil that can be absorbed by plants.

Fixation and competition between elements
A high content of iron, aluminium, manganese and/or calcium keeps down the amount of copper absorbable by plants. A very high amount of soluble phosphate or silicate can chemically bind copper and other trace elements. Copper phosphate or copper silicate is not absorbable for plants. When the concentrations of Copper and phosphate or silicate is low, normal or good, there is no relevant fixation.

High Copper content
A content of copper which is too high can be an indication of some kind of environmental pollution (not necessarily only copper itself). In some cases a closer examination is required. A content of copper which is ample or too high will damage the ground life in the soil. It is dangerous to let sheep graze on a soil for which the assessment of copper is ample and/or higher (especially the race of "tesselaars").