Rain returns like an old friend

A HORSE SHOE WET WITH RAIN. Now that's good luck!
REAL RAIN: We received around 25mls in two fals, after days of dry electrical storms. One thing about electrical storms: they are actually a source of natural fertiliser! They produce a lot of nitrogen which finds its way into te roots of the plants, probably as naughty nitrous oxide. I'll look it up and tell you.
Here it is. I lifted something from a conventional ag science site (The National Science-Technology Roadshow Trust NZ):

"Nitrogen is found in abundance in the air. In fact over 78% of the air is nitrogen, the rest is mainly oxygen. But before nitrogen can get into the soil, and be used by plants to make proteins and enzymes, it must be first turned into water soluble nitrates. Converting nitrogen gas to nitrates takes a lot of energy. There are four main ways of doing this:
1. The decomposition of dead plants and animal material 2. Lightning: the high energy in lightning mixes the oxygen and nitrogen in the air to form nitrates. These dissolve in rain. 3. Industrial processes: need great pressures and high temperatures to make nitrogen fertiliser 4. Legumes (peas, beans, clover). At the end of plant's root, there are swelling or lumps where friendly bacteria change atmospheric nitrogen into soil nitrates.

"Applying nitrogen fertiliser is a large cost for farmers, but it is a lot faster in restoring the soil's nutrients than the other three methods mentioned above."

It is also damaging to the environment, the soil microbial community, and the climate.Here's extracts from an article entitled "Human Alteration of the Global Nitrogen Cycle: Causes and Consequences" by Peter M. Vitousek, Chair, John Aber, Robert W. Howarth, Gene E. Likens, Pamela A. Matson, David W. Schindler, William H. Schlesinger, and G. David Tilman

" Human activities are greatly increasing the amount of nitrogen cycling between the living world and the soil, water, and atmosphere. In fact, humans have already doubled the rate of nitrogen entering the land-based nitrogen cycle, and that rate is continuing to climb. This human-driven global change is having serious impacts on ecosystems around the world because nitrogen is essential to living organisms and its availability plays a crucial role in the organization and functioning of the world’s ecosystems. In many ecosystems on land and sea, the supply of nitrogen is a key factor controlling the nature and diversity of plant life, the population dynamics of both grazing animals and their predators, and vital ecological processes such as plant productivity and the cycling of carbon and soil minerals. .... Excessive nitrogen additions can pollute ecosystems and alter both their ecological functioning and the living communities they support."

Human activities that increase global nitrogen include the production and use of nitrogen fertilizers and the burning of fossil fuels. "The impacts of human domination of the nitrogen cycle that we have identified with certainty include:
• Increased global concentrations of nitrous oxide (N2O), a potent greenhouse gas, in the atmosphere ...
• Losses of soil nutrients such as calcium and potassium that are essential for long-term soil fertility
• Substantial acidification of soils and of the waters of streams and lakes
• Greatly increased transport of nitrogen by rivers into estuaries and coastal waters where it is a major pollutant.
• Accelerated losses of biological diversity, especially among plants adapted to low-nitrogen soils, and subsequently, the animals and microbes that depend on these plants
• Changes in the plant and animal life and ecological processes of estuarine and nearshore ecosystems, and contributed to long-term declines in coastal marine fisheries."
These experts conclude: "National and international policies should attempt to reduce these impacts through the development and widespread dissemination of more efficient fossil fuel combustion technologies and farm management practices that reduce the burgeoning demand for and release of nitrogenous fertilizers."

Artificial fertilisers are not good for the soil or the things (bugs and plants) thta live in it.