phosphorus

Both phosphorus and nitrogen are key nutrients for living organisms.

You're right to guess that Phosphorus can end up in Earth's atmosphere.

The Phosphorus at the bottom of the ocean has to somehow make its way back to the surface, to complete the cycle, to begin the cycle all over again.

The fishing industry helps bring Phosphorus back to land.

If not all of Phosphorus gets used by the crops and large amounts of Phosphorus gets into the rivers, this could cause rapid growth of water plants in the river, which can lead to the water ways getting clogged with organisms, which can change the flow of the water.

But a lot of the Phosphorus in soil gets washed away into rivers by rain and melting snow.

We call all of this – the land phase of the Phosphorus cycle.

And the Phosphorus is recycled back into the soil; same thing with the animals that eat those plants, or eat other animals that have eaten those plants.

They use Phosphorus from the soil to grow.

Now after the Phosphorus is in the soil, plants grow.

So humans can play a role in the first part of the Phosphorus cycle – the breaking down of rocks and the spreading of Phosphorus into the soil by speeding up the rate at which this natural process occurs. You see.

Phosphorus is slowly released as the rocks are broken down and it gets spread around into the soil.

Well, let’s start with the Phosphorus in rocks.

How does Phosphorus get there?

So the Phosphorus cycle has been studied a lot by ecologists because like I said, Phosphorus is an important nutrient and it’s not so abundant.

Salmon contribute important nutrients like carbon and phosphorus.

The fungal hyphae are able to absorb phosphorus that plant roots could not themselves obtain from the very dilute soil solutions, and fungal hyphae can transfer mineral nutrients from one forest plant to another.

Aluminum also reduces the availability of phosphorus, an element in high demand by plants.