When plants and animals die, their molecules become available in soil for use by other organisms like bacteria and fungi. This product is the final break-down constituents of the natural decay or decomposition of plant and animal materials through the biological activities of micro-organisms. This product is commercially available in powdered form as well as liquid form for horticultural use.
How does this work on plants? It chelates the complex nutrient compounds in the soil to convert them to simple forms suitable for plant absorption. This reduces the fertilizer usage by upto 30% and increases flowering and fruiting by up to 70%. So, this is not a fertilizer, but a bio-catalyst and bio-stimulant for the plant. This is an excellent natural and organic way to provide plants and soil with a concentrated dose of essential nutrients, amino acids, vitamins and trace elements.
Before I reveal you the name of this product, let’s quickly know some of the functions or benefits of this powder.
- Improves Soil Structure by providing more space for root growth and beneficial microbial activity. They bind to soil molecules and improve soil structure, and this is especially noticeable in high-clay and compacted soils.
- Reduces Soil Toxins: They don’t just make nutrients easily available for absorption, but also chelate harmful toxins in the soil, preventing them from entering the plant.
- Increases Water Retention in soil by reducing water evaporation by upto 30%.
- Improved Microbial Activity in the soil and chelation of complex nutrient forms to simple forms for better uptake by the roots makes the plant grow healthier with little fertilizer application and increases flowering and fruiting.
Having said that, let’s know what this is called and how to use it properly for best results.
This is called Humus which consists of three components–humic acids, fulvic acids, and humin.
This is available as powdered form and also liquid form. The Liquid is a concentrated humic acid and needs to be diluted with water before applying on plants. Humic acid is easily available at your local garden store or you can even order online.
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Now, Let’s learn how to use it. This is particularly beneficial if your plant has nutritional deficiencies due to poor absorption of nutrients from the soil, which manifests as various leaf yellowing patterns.
So, How to use this? Three Methods to use this:
- Soil Application: The Dosage is 1 teaspoon per litre of water. Mix it well and water 1 cup, that’s about 250 ml of it per plant. If you are using liquid humic acid, add 3 ml of it per litre of water. You should see results within 1 – 2 weeks.
- Foliar Spray: You can add one teaspoon of this per gallon of water and spray on the plants. 1 gallon = 3.78 litres. Please check the usage instructions on the product label and use accordingly. If you are using liquid humic acid, add 1 ml per litre of water for foliar spray.
- Compost Tea: You can add 1 teaspoon per gallon to your compost tea while brewing. This will certainly help in better absorption of nutrients. For beginners, Compost tea is made by adding compost like decomposed cowdung or vermicompost into water and allowing it to brew for 5 to 7 days and then you dilute this further like in 1:10 ratio and water your plants.
Well, before I show you the actual recipe or the Formula for the making of our so called magic solution, you must know some Basic concepts. Please do not skip these 5 points am gonna discuss now. Will try to make it as short and as simple as possible, specially for beginners.
1. What do you mean by foliar Spray? Foliage means leaves! So the term foliar spray says it all, that is Spraying a liquid fertilizer on your plants foliage which aids in absorption of certain essential elements like calcium, magnesium through their stomata. Stomata are pores found in the epidermis of leaves which help in nutrient absorption and also gas exchange.
2. Calcium and Its importance: Calcium is the most important component of a plants cell wall. Hence for cell division and growth its indispensable, especially in rapid growers like tomatoes. So we will keep this point in mind and add calcium into our mix.
3. Magnesium and Its importance: Did you know Magnesium is the central atom in between four nitrogen atoms in the chlorophyll molecule. For beginners, Chlorophyll is the pigment present in leaves which is essential for photosynthesis – that’s plant food production. So we will keep this point in mind and add magnesium into our mix using our famous organic Epsom salt.
4. Soil PH concept: We have discussed in detail about the importance of soil ph in nutrient absorption in my video titled Ideal Soil PH for plants. You can check that HERE. Well! when it comes to foliar spray of fertilizer solution, its completely independent of the soil PH, because nutrients are absorbed through leaves.
- And last concept: Many Experts recommend applying egg shells andcalcium tablets to soil and some evenmake a smoothie juice or paste using all kitchen waste like banana peels, fruit peels and what not. This in perhaps unscientific according to me to directly apply to your plants. I don’t know! If you have any scientific explanation to this, please do write in the comment box. What I feel is why not utilize this idea of making this smoothie and keeping a dedicated heavy duty blender or mixer for this purpose for faster composting. Yes! if you are adding this paste to your compost bin and feeding your earth worms, this can accelerate composting process.
So you can utilize this concept of foliar feeding if your plants are not performing well despite all your efforts, care, fertilizing, watering promptly and what not! Many viewers keep asking the same question. So why not make it a habit of alternating your feeds – that’s fertilizing your plants once in 15 days with foliar spray to feed your plants. Because this idea is independent of soil PH value.
Now The Formula or the recipe of this Magic Fertilizer liquid.
I will quickly list out the ingredients one by one and quickly explain the benefit of each of these components.
1. Water: Nothing to explain about this universal solvent. We will formulate this recipe for 1 liter of water.
2. Milk: You can use skimmed milk or if available Raw milk is best. You can even use spoilt milk, butter milk or stuff like that. Use it with lower than 20 percent dilution in water that is 1:5 dilution. So you can add about 100 ml or 200 ml milk to our universal solvent. Milk is not only a source of calcium, but also an antifungal for treatment of powdery mildew and blossom end rot disease on tomato and other vegetable plants. It also kills many plant viruses like tobacco mosaic virus. In place if milk you can add 1 liter of a special water. Yes that’s special calcium rich water for plants. It s nothing but the left over water after you hard boil few eggs. The egg shells release a lot of calcium into this water during boiling.
3. Epsom Salt that’s magnesium sulfate which is a greatest source of magnesium and sulfur. This is easily available at a gardening store or at your local pharmacist and even online. So the dosage is max 5 gms or little lesser than a teaspoon per 1 liter of water.
4. Then the Most important ingredient for adding the major NPK elements into the foliar spray is COMPOST TEA. So, how do you make compost tea? Its really simple. Just Add a handful of decomposed manure or compost like cowdung powder or vermicompost per liter of water. You can make your own quantity of 2 liters or 5 liters depending on your garden size. Allow this to brew for atleast 1 week. Make sure you stir this atleast once every 24 hours to oxygenate this mix till 1 week. Then strain out the liquid using a cloth and use this liquid. I shall make a detailed video some other time on how to use some simple gadgets like an aquarium air pump to quickly make your compost tea.
Well, For now, Once the compost tea is ready, you should dilute this like 1:5 in water and then add about 1 liter to the above solution. Normally if you are using only the compost tea as a foliar spray, you need to use 1:10 dilution. But here we are making a 2.1 liter solution in total. I Hope you got my point!
That’s it, mix it thoroughly and load the spray bottle or use your electric sprayer or whatever and foliar feed your plants. Spray very early in the morning or late in the evening because leaf stomatas are well opened at this period so that absorption happens at its best.
Many studies and research articles on goat dung as a fertilizer have been published on international journals. All of them say, Goat manure is one of the best animal manures for healthy soil and plants, specially for backyard organic vegetable gardening. And if you have couple of goats with you for their milk or whatever purpose, you should never throw away their droppings. You will learn a lot of important stuff about goat dung by the end of this video. Please watch it till the end and learn how to use it and how much to use in your home gardening or container gardening.
This is even available online at amazon. You can CHECK HERE.
So lets begin:
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- Goat or sheep pellets are very much Dry compared with cow dung or horse dung. Hence these are very easy to collect or store.
- It is Virtually odourless and hence easy to work with and easy to spread on your soil Directly. You cannot directly apply cowdung or horsedung without decomposing, because this can burn your plants.
- Its relatively Free of insects and maggots unlike cow-dung. But drying in sulight for 2 to 3 days before using or before storing is always better.
- It’s a Cheap and Best Organic Fertilizer for your plants: As I said earlier, the pellets can be used for direct applications to flower and vegetable gardens without the fear of getting your plants burnt.
- Goat pellets contains lots of nutrients, the Major NPK elements – Nitrogen, Phosphorous and Potassium, and many trace elements like Calcium, Magnesium, Iron, Manganese and many others. The Nitrogen value may be higher than cowdung or horse dung especially when these goat pellets are mixed with goats urine, whether by default or by using some goat beds specially created to increase its nitrogen value. In this case, composting this prior to application is recommended.
- This manure Increases Flowering and Fruiting and Promotes overall Plant growth. Goat droppings can be used in nearly any type of garden, including that of flowering and fruiting plants or
- Use Goat dropping in your compost bin. It not only enriches your final compost value, but also it decomposes very faster. This is because pelletized droppings allow more airflow into compost piles, which speeds up composting time as well.
- It’s a Low-cost Pure Organic Fertilizer for your vegetable gardening. You can get it for almost free specially when you visit any rural area or you can also get it for free in cities. You know how I collected these pellets? These were collected during the Bakrid festival where you see lot of sheep brought into the city and homes. You get lots of this to collect and save for the whole year. For me this is the most important benefit. Because I never use any chemicals for my vegetable gardening, not even a chemical pesticide. Well..
- Goat dung is also an Excellent soil conditioner: you can mix it while making your potting mix, similar to how to add decomposed cowdung into your mix. You can watch a related video HERE.
- Mulching: for beginners, A mulch is a layer of material applied to the top surface of soil to prevent moisture evaporation, reduce weed growth like grass clipping, twigs, wood chips, bark chips, dry leaves, hay and so on..
One Caution regarding Fresh Sheep dropping or any animal manure for that matter – Just because goat manure is a natural product doesn’t mean it’s completely safe. They can release disease causing microorganisms into the food chain that can make you sick. So better always sun dry completely for 2 -3 days before application or compost it and then use.
Now How to use and how much to use? This is an organic fertilizer. So you can use it similar to how you use cowdung or horse dung. A handful of this on a container once every 15 days for flowering plants or Once in 30 days for your other general plants. Make sure you Apply this after raking or tilling the top layer of your soil.
So, there we have it folks, that was a short article on goat or sheep dung as fertilizer in gardening.
References:
https://scialert.net/fulltextmobile/?doi=ijss.2007.142.147