Elaine Ingham, Pioneer of Soil Food Web Concept, Dies at 73

C. — Elaine Ingham, a soil scientist who popularized the concept of the soil food web and led efforts in the organic gardening and farming movement, died on February 16 in a memory care residence. She was 73 years old at the time of her death.

Her daughter, Jenna Noel, said the death followed a diagnosis of dementia last year. Ingham showed that plants actively orchestrate an underground world where roots exude sugars to attract bacteria and fungi. These microorganisms nourish plant roots and protect them from parasites.

Protozoa and nematodes also play crucial roles in the soil food web.

By managing the soil beneath a plant, growers could prevent pests and diseases aboveground, protect against erosion, and retain water, Ingham stated. 'Dr.

Elaine is largely responsible for the understanding by gardeners and farmers that soil is alive,' said Jeff Lowenfels, a gardening writer, in a column after her death. Ingham advocated replacing synthetic fertilizers with organic compost, criticizing the widespread use of chemicals in farming. She helped write the book 'Soil Biology Primer,' published by the Soil and Water Conservation Society.

Ingham once told an agricultural conference in Texas that she could speak for 'the next three months' on soil topics. 'Mother Nature figured out this system for keeping everything properly balanced approximately 4 billion years ago,' she said. , from 2011 to 2014.

She worked as a research scientist in the department of botany and plant pathology at Oregon State University in Corvallis for 15 years, beginning in 1986. Ingham lived in Corvallis until moving to South Carolina last year. She founded the Soil Food Web School in 2014, which certifies students for work as lab technicians, running compost businesses, and consulting with farmers and growers.

The school grew out of her consulting business, which offered soil analysis at the microscopic level to farmers and advice on replacing synthetic fertilizers with organic compost. 'Growing up, there was always a FedEx package of soil in our refrigerator,' her daughter Jenna Noel recalled in an interview.

Ingham suggested that her relationship with administrators at Oregon State led her to leave academia to run her consulting business full time.

'Oregon State University and I had very opposing views on genetically engineered organisms, and they didn’t like it,' she said in a 2019 podcast. She left Oregon State the following year after her 2001 testimony.

Ingham voiced opposition to GMOs at an international biosafety conference in Madrid in 1995.

She testified to a government commission in New Zealand in 2001 about research on a genetically modified soil bacteria, Klebsiella planticola. The research on Klebsiella planticola was done by Ingham and a graduate student in the 1990s. The modified Klebsiella planticola was engineered to convert plant waste into alcohol.

It killed wheat plants in the laboratory, Ingham stated. , conceivably all terrestrial plants,' Ingham stated.

She later said she was wrong that the EPA had approved a field trial of Klebsiella planticola.

Elaine Ruth Stowe was born on June 26, 1952, in St. Paul, Minn. She was the middle of three daughters of Clarence and Ruth (Sweet) Stowe.

Clarence Stowe was chair of the department of veterinary science at the University of Minnesota. Ingham graduated in 1974 with a bachelor’s degree in biology and chemistry from St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn.

She met her future husband, Russell Ingham, at St. Olaf College. They became a couple during a semester studying tide pools in the Florida Keys, when Ingham cut her foot on a sea urchin and Russell Ingham brought her to an emergency room.

Ingham and Russell Ingham married in 1975. She earned her master’s degree in microbiology from Texas A&M in 1977. Ingham earned her doctorate in microbiology from Colorado State University in 1981.

Elaine Ingham and Russell Ingham joined the faculty of Oregon State. She lectured around the world, explaining organic farming in clear language.

Her work influenced farmers and gardeners to view soil as a living system rather than inert dirt.