Maximizing Living Roots” is the third principle of soil health and it’s focused on feeding the soil. When I first saw this phrase, I confess–it struck me as a bit odd:  since living roots can’t exist without whole living plants, why not just say “maximize living plants?” After a while it dawned on me—if we had a monoculture of a single species of living plants with either short, fibrous roots or just deep taproots, we could potentially maximize living plants, but not necessarily roots.  In order to maximize living roots, we need the widest variety of plants growing together that the site can maintain (more on this next week when we cover diversity).

Here’s a nice illustration of the differences in plant roots among various types of plants.  When we have the maximum concentration and variety of plant roots, then we’ve truly maximized living roots:

Here is a link to the full article.
https://onpasture.com/2021/03/15/what-do-plant-roots-do-for-soil-health/