For this trial there are 4, 1m (approx) square beds as follows:
1 - Soil
2 - Soil + seaweed foliar spray
3 - Soil + sea minerals
4 - Soil + rock dust
See page 1 for more details
| Bed treatments |
BRIX
|
|||||
| Carrots | Brassicas |
Onions
|
Lettuce* | Beans* | ||
| BRIX | Yield(gms) | |||||
| Control | 4.5 | 5.0 | 10.0 | 2286 | 2.0 | 5.0 |
| Seaweed spray | 6.0 | 6.0 | 9.0 | 2496 | - | 4.0 |
| Sea water | 9.0 | 9.0 | 11 | 2478 | 2.0 | 4.0 |
| SEER Rock dust | 9.5 | 9.0 | 12 | 2826 | 2.0 | 4.0 |
* Readings taken early in season. The rest were taken during the first week in October.
Overall the remineralised beds did slightly better than the control (no treatment) and the bed where plants were regularly sprayed with seaweed extract. The bed treated with rock dust from The SEER Centre was very slightly better that the one where desalianted sea water was used.
The 4 onions patches produced over 10kg from 36 onions in the equivalent of 1 square metre. That is a remarkable result.
I intend to continue the trial next year to see if there is any cumulative effects.
2 Comments
Write a Comment»Gardening in the tropics as we do the local wisdom is to add seawater at the rate of 1 per 10000 to all application of liquid to the soil / plants. This includes any sprays / fertilliser applications or watering.
Thomas, that’s interesting. I used a commercial product that is desalinated sea water much used by Dr Maynard Murray some 50 years ago. It seems to work and is said to give instant and constant results i.e. is less variable in its action than rock dust.