By Maximiliano Rizzi for Trust.org
Chile's volcanic ash cloud has blown into Argentina, closing airports, hurting tourism and threatening sheep herds by blanketing grazing pastures, but it may eventually improve the soil.
Experts say that in about 10 years soils in Argentina's Patagonian sheep-growing areas will start to register the benefits of having been covered by ash from a volcano that erupted across the border in Chile early this month.
Argentina is a traditional exporter of lambs' wool and the soil improvements could make for better grazing in areas hit by drought in recent years. The sector is key to the local economy. Some herders are trucking their sheep north to the Pampas, where pastures have not been covered with gray ash.
The volcano, in Chile's Puyehue-Cordon Caulle chain, sent a tower of ash into the air. Some blew into Argentina, swamping pastures and ski towns such as Bariloche. Some 5 million hectares were covered by up to 1 foot (30 cm) of gray grit.
But the news is not all bad.
"This, over the long term, will help to rejuvenate the..Read Full Article
