Hybrid Farming: Nutrients and Irrigation Part-II

 Straight to business

 Drip irrigation is essential to follow either of this method, drip kits are now cheap  so dont make excuses , drip saves water and prevent water wastage , washing of top soil.

Macro Nutrient: NPK: 

During  soil preparation , add manure lots of it , don't throw or burn your crop residue , add them to soil

NPK is major nutrient for your plant,

if you are willing  to go full organic:

here for you, 

Nitrogen: Compost/Manure

Phosphorus: Rock Phosphate 

Potassium: Potash Muriate

every 21 days , provide roots with Azotobactor Chroococum so that nitrogen fixation continues ,via drip irrigation, use 2 to 3 ml per litre 

If you see no result , try giving Potash and Phosphorus Solubilizing bacteria.

 

People fine with Chemical fertilizer:

 go for water soluble fertilizer , like NPK 19:19:19 when foliage is growing and use  just 2 to  3gm/litre, provide your plant every 21 days. 

every 21 days , provide roots with Azotobactor Chroococum so that nitrogen fixation continues ,via drip irrigation, use 1 ml per litre

dilute mono-potassium phosphate 2gm/litre during flowering and fruiting phase  via drip every 21days.

Micro Nutrients: [Dont use in organic farming] 

These are essential for strong plant immunity

Iron[Fe]:  Most important of micro-nutrients , many leaf disease may look like fungal but are due to lack of Iron , use 6% Chelated iron supliment , 1 to 2g/litre in drip system every 40days, 

Essential Micro nutrient supplement : get micro-nutrient supplement with  Mg,Ca,Zn,Cu,B,Mo,Co , make sure EDTA chelated , use 1g/litre of water and give it every 40days.

Bio Stimulants:

Seaweed Extract: Use 1 to 3ml per litre over drip every 11days , these seaweed contain plant hormones that makes plants grow more roots, flower and produce more leaves further enhances immunity in plants. 

Humic/Fulvic Acid:  use 2 to 3g/litre , Fulvic acid and Humic acid , these compounds increase nutrient intake ,drought tolerance , water infiltration , aeration, chelating minerals. 

Keep these two product , for small scale or home growing of veggies is enough. 

If you a commercial farmer , you can look at organic fruiting hormones that helps in fruiting and flower thus improving yield by 20 to 40% , Chaste Berry and Goose Berry based extracts works as miracle.You can use natural rooting hormones  too for faster robust root development.

Part -III  we will talk about seeds , why we must avoid GMO? where to get seeds in India?

Hybrid Farming : Killing the Chemical killers. Part -I

 In farming world , their two types of people , one is who will put GMO, throw all carcinogenic chemicals and making everyone slowly die and another type is stone-age agriculturist who believe hybrids are bad , all chemicals bad , even adding microbes from outside is bad . 

Well reality lies somewhere in between , something i would like to call as smart farming , combining best of organic with best of safe technology .

I would  like share some technological & organic farming practices that i used in my own garden:- 

While handling microbes and botanical solution use gloves mask and safetly glasses. If you under immunosuppresive disease or drug avoid handling anyform of biological solution and agents.

Insecticide:

Using Chemical insecticide is mad man's game , not only it harm to us humans it destroys  ecosystem [it kills useful insects like Bea's and lady birds ]. It destroys soil and water , causes cancer in humans. 

Neem doesnt kill Bea and Lady bird but kill bad guys like Aphids, 

shall we let insect eat our food then? Answer is absolutely not , we can use biological control agent like Neem and Pongamia oil based extract , good bacteria that safe for us but kills insects. 

Remember to spray every 14 to 21 days to have a protective layer depending on your situation , 

Only Neem oil is not enough if pest are invasive, Azadirachtin extracted from neem is far more useful , for protection spray Azadirachtin  1500PPM every 14 days as instructed by your local agricultural expert , use 10,000PPM if your garden is taken over by hostile pest in every 7 days as per instruction

Fungicide:  

Neem extract act as an amazing fungicide , you already done 90% job my friend , but if fungal problem persist ,use other control agent  

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/256548351_Efficacy_of_Azadirachtin_and_fungicides_on_growth_and_survival_of_Macrophomina_phaseolina_causing_charcoal_rot_of_soybean

 In my garden the main problem was root rot due to over watering caused by rain , in such cases soil mixed with Trichoderma Viridi , it colonizes roots of plants and eat out other fungus and produces useful compounds essential to plants. Another Fungus which is useful to plant is mycorrhiza which help plants to take more micro-nutrients from soil. If you face other problem related plant's consider experimenting by spraying highly dilute [2ml/per litre] of Trichoderma Harzianum , AmpelomycesQuisqualis can be used in case of powdery mildew. 

mycorrhiza  must be introduced to soil few weeks before Trichoderma , best is use mycorrhiza  in seed treatment or while growing sapling  for transplantation,

Before treating soil with bio control agent , it is advisable to get rid of unwanted pathogens in soil for first time user with agricultural lime dust , it is recommended to consult your local  agricultural expert regarding the doses , then add powdered neem seed cake and  pongamia seed cake powder in little amount , then cover and leave the soil for few weeks. 

You can use any one kind of biological control agent  for fungus or use consortium of all to spray depending on all what available in market. 

Pseudomonas Fluorescens can be introduced as an AntiBacterial agent to make sure soil is living only with strong root system , it also produces  phytohormones

Herbicide: Are you insane ? Why you need that? While tilling the soil ,just crush unwanted plants as extra manure, then grow veggies like Spinach and Coriander in free space , that will fast grow and not allow any space for unwanted plants to grow , not only act as herbicide but act you get extra vegetable , now even you can grow ginger and turmeric under soil to act as layered farming. Now not only you growing chilly or tomatoes but you are growing spinach and ginger , you not only saved money from herbicide ,  not only saved yourself from health hazard but got three different crops to harvest. 

Next article we will discuss about Macro and Micro nutrients  how we can reduce chemicals and use safe chemical with organic manure and our good friends bacteria and earth worms. See you on next article.