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"Martin Brown" wrote in message ... In message , Franz Heymann writes "Martin Brown" wrote in message ... In message , Franz Heymann writes My point was that I do not understand what process can determine the amount of arbitrary organic matter in a sample by simply shaking a suspension of the sample in a liquid and looking for a colour change. Probably something like: a fairly powerful oxidising agent, a catalyst and a suitable indicator. I am sincerely doubtful whether *all* organic compounds would respond identically to such a group of agents. Oh. I can assure you that *all* organic compounds will respond the same way to sufficiently powerful oxidising agents - ending up as CO2. The problem is that most of these chemicals are far too dangerous to be used in a soil test. PTFE and a few other designer molecules might resist attack at room temperature but ultimately even they give up the ghost. I was talking about responding by imparting a characteristic colour to a test fluid. It may be more specific than that - targeting the acidic peaty component that is guaranteed to rot and change volume. That would be a pH meter. That does not measure "total organic content", and would give wildly misleading results in limestone country. There are more cunning ways to measure humic acids. I don't doubt that. By the way, I don't like the catch-all term "humic acids". I still think it is a scam. I am pretty sure the test being sold is supremely irrelevant to gardening, but if the Organic(TM) suckers want to buy into a spurious chemical test of "goodness" then so be it..... Agreed Franz |
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