After years of research and field study, Tomasz Falkowski is putting his experience about the importance of healthy soils into practice.
“I think the land is an excellent teacher of what will work, particularly in the New Mexico area,” said the Associate Forestry Professor at New Mexico Highlands University in Las Vegas. “Learning the language of the land to understand what is going on and what practices I can adapt and what processes I will need is a prolonged process.”
Falkowski has studied soil health and its relationship to plants for years in Mexico, New York, and now in New Mexico’s Tierra y Montes Soil and Water Conservation District. Recently, he was named an NACD Soil Health Champion.
“It’s been all lessons,” Falkowski said of the process. “You definitely need to take an adaptive management approach to things, particularly in the way that climate change is destabilizing what’s been considered normal. It’s really critical to make sure you have healthy soil when so much of the climate is in flux.”
The passion began years ago, while completing graduate research in Syracuse, NY considering how agroforestry restores soil health and in turn how agroforestry management can be applied in a socioecological restoration context.
