Completely irrelevant title for an article about why the Airspade is not the way for decompaction but bear with me.
Firstly, we own an airspade, it’s a great tool for finding roots while causing minimum damage in the right soil types. Emphasis on the right soil types. If the sand content is too high you’ll shot-blast the roots, if the clay content is too high and too dry you’ll never move the soil to find a root.
Therein lies part of why I believe the airspade isn’t the tool for decompaction work, it needs too many ideal situations to deliver properly and with an operator that isn’t experienced damage will occur.
So why isn’t it the tool for decompaction?
The simple answer is the sheer amount of damage it can cause to soil structure and Mycorrhizal fungi. There’s a huge amount of literature out there that says tilling the soil, which in effect the airspade is when decompacting, has a negative effect on soil quality. It can also create cold soil, which can reduce the numbers of beneficial soil microbes that help trees take up nutrients and can protect them against pests diseases.
What about damage to the Mycorrhizae?
The very act of air tilling damages the delicate hyphae, and as we’re already dealing with reduced beneficial mycorrhizal numbers due to compaction/anaerobic conditions that’s the last thing we want to do. Couple this with a reduction in soil temperatures and a temporary reduction in moisture, unless you add mulch.
There is the school of thought that you can offset this damage by introducing spores to add re-colonisation, but the science shows this is pointless.
Failure rates of mycorrhizal inoculants are around 85% in optimal conditions, and despite some claims, the airspade isn’t creating an optimal environment
You have to ask yourself is this really the best way to save an already struggling tree by damaging the things it really needs to help it?
We think not, which is why we only use it for investigatory work and in extreme cases for vertical mulching in depleted soils in conjunction with the terravent and soil drenches.