Baking Soda is pure sodium bicarbonate used mainly for cooking purpose. It should not be confused with either Baking powder or Washing soda. Washing soda is sodium carbonate and baking powder contains only about 30% baking soda plus other ingredients.
Now let’s list out the baking soda hacks and benefits:
10. Encourage Flower Blooming: Prepare a spray or solution by adding 1 teaspoon baking soda in 1 litre of water. Mix it well and now spray this on your plants with buds or unopened flowers. This will not only encourage blooming but also take care of any fungal spores on the plant.
9. Baking Soda Pesticide & Fungicide: Let’s prepare our most powerful and universal pesticide and fungicide solution to treat almost all types of pests in your garden like the aphids, mealybugs, thrips, mites, whiteflies, worms, caterpillars, soil fungus, plant fungi like powdery mildew, black spot rose disease, leaf rust, leaf miners and many more.
– Take 1 litre of water in a container or in a spray bottle.
– Add 2 Teaspoons of Baking Soda into this. You can add 3 teaspoons if you feel the pest attack is too severe.
– Add 1 teaspoon of Neem oil to this. If you do not have neem oil, you can add any vegetable oil like olive oil into this. But Neem Oil is the best to make it a universal pesticide. You can also add Clove oil or Eucalyptus oil to make it more potent.
– Now Add some 10 drops of liquid soap into this. You can use your dish washing liquid soap or even hand wash liquid or any organic liquid soap if you are 100% organic gardener.
– Mix it thoroughly well and also always give it a good shake before spraying.
– Before you spray on your entire plant, please perform a patch test on a leaf and leave it for 1 – 2 hours to see the potency. If the leaf wilts, you will need to dilute it further.
8. Cleaning Plant Foliage: Removing the dust and dirt on the leaves encourages better photosynthesis and helps in better growth and health of your plants. To prepare this solution, add half a teaspoon of baking soda in 1 litre of water in a spray bottle and mix it well. Spray on the leaves and use a soft cloth to mop the leaves.
7. To Kill Cabbage Worms: Take Baking soda + Any flour like wheat flour in 1:1 ratio and mix it well. Sprinkle this powder on the cabbage or broccoli leaves. The worms munch on this and die within 1 or 2 days.
6. To Eliminate Slugs and Snails: There are two ways to use baking soda for this purpose. Firstly Sprinkle baking soda directly on slugs and snails to kill them; this might look cruel for some people though. The second method is to draw a boundary around the plant container to prevent slugs or snails from crawling over your plant.
5. Drive away Foul Smell from your Compost Pile: Just sprinkle baking soda on the top of your compost pile to get rid of any foul smell.
4. Weed Killer: Sprinkle baking soda directly on the weeds, specially in cracks and crevices. It will gradually burn the foliage and weeds should disappear in a few days. It will not only kill the weeds but also prevent new weeds from growing for a longer duration of time. But Be careful not to sprinkle it on your favourite plants.
3. Cleaning Your Garden Stuff: Prepare a solution by mixing 2 teaspoons of baking soda and 2 teaspoons of liquid soap per litre of water to clean your garden tools, dirty pots and even garden furniture with this solution.
2. Keep Cut Flowers Fresh for a Longer Time: Just add half a teaspoon of baking soda into the vase water. If your vase is larger, you can add 1 teaspoon.
1: HACK FOR SOIL PH TESTING: If you do not have any soil ph testing gadget, you can roughly check whether your soil ph is alkaline or acidic. You will need baking soda and Vinegar to perform this test.
Collect samples of your garden soil in small containers from different areas or containers in your garden, and take a half-cup of vinegar and a half-cup of baking soda. This is simple school chemistry – Acid and Base reaction. Acidic PH is below 7, alkaline is above 7 and 7 is neutral PH.
So when you Pour the vinegar into one of the soil samples and If the soil begins to bubble, it is alkaline, meaning the pH level is above 7.
Now you mix half a cup of water and baking soda and mix well. If the soil bubbles, it means the pH level is below 7, and it is acidic soil.
What we are basically doing is, creating mini water reservoirs or mini water storage houses for your plants. These reservoirs provide a stable supply of water and nutrients to plants. We increase soil water holding capacity to 500 to 1000 times. This is really useful in drought prone areas or if you have water shortage. This method helps to conserve water, save your valuable time, manpower and perhaps money not only in summer but in other times like when you have water shortage and also its a great hacks when you are out on a vacation. One more benefit of this is, It also reduces the quantity and frequency of fertilizer application. The research article links to this video are provided in video description, you can check the detailed articles on this gardening idea.
Well, Now How to Perform This Hack? Actually I am experimenting this method and showing you how it works. I have taken two containers of identical size and soil plus the identical plants of almost the same size. Because the watering requirement may vary between different plant species and also different plant sizes. So, I have taken identical plants and labelling one container as T – that is TEST PLANT and the other one as C – that is Control plant. We will be obviously adding the SAP substance to Test container and not to the Control. Both of these are watered only once on day 1 and the moisture levels are checked daily or on alternate days.
So now lets look into the Procedure on How to add this substance:
If you are doing this on your existing potted plants, you need to dig out some holes around your plant. You can keep the depth of each hole to about 3 -4 inches depending on your plant size and root system. Do this carefully and make sure you do not damage or dig on the roots. You can use any tool like a screw driver or even a pipe. Make some 4 to 6 holes around your plant, depending on your pot size and also plant size. If your plant has larger water requirement, then dig much deeper holes.
Now Add Just 1 or 2 gm of this SAP material into each hole. 1 teaspoon I think its about 4 – 5 gram. So add 1 -2 gm approx. into each hole and then cover these holes with soil. Then add about half to 1 litre of water depending on your container size. I will discuss about what is this SAP compound shortly, but be assured this is a fully bio-degradable and non-toxic substance.
One more method you can use this, if you are repotting any plant, you can mix about 1 to 2 teaspoons of this stuff into your potting mix. Mixing it with soil results in a light, fluffy, aerated well draining soil, which is really good for your plant health. But do not use this for succulents and similar plants.
So, Now before discussing on What is SAP, will show you the result of this experiment. On day 1 after adding this substance and water, leave on for an hour for the SAP to absorb water. Now you test the moisture level using this useful gadget which measures both pH and moisture levels. The link to purchase this is on my website www.gkvk.in. One more point to clarify – this is not a promotional video where I am promoting some companys stuff. On my website, I have only listed the things which I have purchased and tested personally.
Well, I have kept both Pot T and Pot C in the same location and similar climatic conditions under my 50 percent shadehouse to receive the same amount of sunlight. Make sure these are not watered daily and in case if you are expecting rain, you can shift to a safe location to protect them from rain.
Now on Day 1 after watering both Test and Control Pots, the moisture level is very good in both container – showing Fully WET in the meter.
Its not at one point in soil, I am checking it all around the soil in pot T as you can notice in the video.
After 2 Days, you can see the moisture level has remained nearly the same in Test Pot – that is its still completely WET and the control pot moisture level has fallen from wet to just MOIST.
On Day 3, you can see Test pot is still WET and the Control Pot is showing DRY. This means it needs watering immediately. The results may vary depending on your zones climatic conditions.
Well, On Day 5, You can see there s a fall in moisture level, but still its showing MOIST and can continue for a day or two. You can either water your plant at this point or wait for another 2 days and rewater so that the hygroscopic meaning water absorbing crystals takeup this water and hold and supply this to your plant for another week.
So, this proves the effectiveness of this method and you do not need to water your plants frequently and your plants remain content, happy and healthy, This is really useful specially in summer or even if you are going on a vacation!
So Now Quickly Lets Learn Whats this SAP and What is the cost of this substance and where its available?
SAP is nothing but Super Absorbent Polymer or hydrophilic or hygroscopic polymer chains, SAP also sometimes called as Hydrogel substance. It is an eco-friendly, non-toxic, harmless, biodegradable material with super good water absorption and water holding capacity ranging from 100 to 1000 times water retention to its weight. Different grades of SAP are available for different purposes with different capacities.
Water beads or water crystal balls are also similar hygroscopic polyers, they are usually sodium polyacrylate and used for similar purpose.
In agriculture they are used as water reservoirs within soil and they absorb the water when it is raining and release water back when it is dry.
Now How much does this cost? This is not too costly. I got this 250 gms of SAP for about 4 USD. May be Its much cheaper if purchased in larger quantities. You can find the link to purchase this in description and also almost all products that I have purchased and tested are listed at my website www.gkvk.in . Its not a functional store, but a catalogue of links to items that I have purchased or those that I recommend.