Remembering Leopold: In the Midwest, the real black gold is our deep, dark soils
Once upon a time, there was a poor mountaineer named Jed. One day he was out shooting at some food, he obviously missed, and a thick, black crude oil came bubbling up where his bullet hit the ground. Or so the story goes.
In the Midwest, the real black gold is our deep, dark soils. Those prairie soils are dark and black for the same reason that crude oil, coal, or graphite powder is black: They all have a lot of carbon. When we break the prairie, a lot of that carbon is lost in following years.
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