So there has been a lot of buzz around the mag about
Advancing Eco Agriculture aka Biological Advantage. I figured its time to start a thread and lets discuss these products and the science behind them, good and bad. No paid sponsors, just real talk and opinions on what these things bring to the table.

AEA, or BA isnt just about the products its also about the methods used to achieve superior plant health and full genetic expression.

So lets talk plant health...

health monitoring, via Brix, Sap PH..

increasing health, via foliar feeding, trace minerals and balanced soils..

For those of you who dont know and would like to know what Im talking about. Here are some links to check out.

https://growbetterfood.com/

https://www.novacropcontrol.nl/en


listen to these talks:

2013 Soil & Nutrition Conference: Putting Principles into Practice
John Kempf: Part 1/ Part 2/Part 3/Part 4

Dan Kittredge

https://www.bionutrient.org/audio/201...erekandDan.mp3

https://www.bionutrient.org/audio/201...rekandJohn.mp3

https://www.bionutrient.org/audio/201...rekandJohn.mp3




FE

Here is a brix reading from a sample that was taken from an indoor plant, grown in balanced and amended soil, fed once weekly for 3 weeks an AEA foliar recipe that was gifted to me.



https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php...tureid=1291201

I checked several leaves from the same plant as well as different plants all in the same area on each. I got pretty consistent results. The highest readings coming from the new growth. One issue that may be affecting the reading is I took readings about 2 hours after a heavy watering. about 12 hours after a heavy foliar of the AEA recipe. I took samples from the 2 different plants, same cultivar, both were indoors different rooms, different medium. One soil one from coco. They both received foliar feedings at the same intervals and same days. The coco is fed botanicare the soil was an amendment blend I mix myself. to my surprise they both had the same brix reading. The coco plant is much much smaller although they are from the same batch of clones. Plant sap was 6.2 on the soil grown and I somehow spaced taking the sap PH of the coco grown plant.



So then I took a petiole cross section to examine under the microscope and I was surprised again. The larger plant from soil had holes in the petiole and some was even hollowed at the center. I took this as a negative sign akin to having hollow stems and boron deficiency. I did notice a large hollow stem when I topped my GG4's in the same soil. I have been experiencing some incredible growth rates using the aea foliar x balanced amended soil. Im wondering if I need to hit them harder or more often with foliars to keep up with the speed of growth. Possibly they are showing these symptoms because of accelerated growth and maybe they are unable to uptake the needed boron quickly enough? I have petiole pics but I want to sample again and see if I get the same results. I also noticed that the soil grown petiole had much thicker cell walls than the coco grown. Also that it was harder to cut slices of, even with a razor I could not make a clean slice without sliding the blade. Ill be back with some pics and data ... some pics from my other thread Big Soil Little Room. The soil plant that I mentioned earlier came from this space.

Day 1
https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php...tureid=1284935


Day 10

https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php...tureid=1288204

Day 15

https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php...tureid=1290504

Hmmm. I've never heard hollow stems being tied to a deficiency. Always thought it was genetic. Some girls with big hollow stems seem to pith up as they age and get larger. Glad you started this thread.

Interesting regarding your perspective about the hollow petioles/stems. Only thing I can relate is quite a few years back talking to Kempf about his Photomag and alfalfa. He said one of the benefits of use is alfalfa stems would fill out thus increasing yield. Growers with favorable growing seasons were also getting an extra cutting per year.

Great looking plants, awesome growth rate.

I will say we finally got a bottle of Rejuvenate that didn't blow up in shipment. Seems they did tweak the formula a bit or at least this is a new batch.

I can't provide any sap feedback this year and only anecdotal. For various reasons the soil mix at 3 locations not what we would have liked yet still getting awesome results with the foliar program which includes PHT calcium and phosphorous, Photomag, Seastim, Seashield, Rejuvenate, Albion calcium, Ca-25 and Sea-Crop. Everyone using the program noting a big difference this year

Next year our focus will be better soil and some sap testing.

Do you have a soil test? They are called plant health supplements for a reason.

Ca B and Si work synergistically. If you are taking up K In place of Ca you cannot make full use of the B in photomag.

Once you are comfortable take a look at aea Co. You can keep roots growing the entire plant cycle and combined with kelp that is a very good thing.

Take a look at the thread m astra is in.

CG,
Good to hear they got the rejuvenate working better, Mine still swells up but works fine as far as I can tell.


MJ

I have a bag of Co on hand I also have solubor as well. Yea I do have a soil test, 12 of them actually, lol. I can reference each bed specifically to see what levels were.. Ill have a look.. and get it posted here..


LB,

Kempf says hollow stems are B defs. Lots of ppl think its just what stems do. Kempf argues otherwise. Ive seen cultivars I had never seen a solid stem, get solid as an oak from foliar feeding B alone..

MJ here are the tests.. Ill have to wait til I can get in to see what number bed it is...

https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php...tureid=1267418
https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php...tureid=1267419
https://www.icmag.com/ic/picture.php...tureid=1267420

The Gorillas with the hollow stems are in SB8 looks like the K is rather high in that bed...

MJ,
What you said about the K in place of Ca not letting the plant utilize the B seems spot on looking at the soil tests
How does a plant not uptake what you foliar feed it? I understand in the soil but does it select minerals and nutrients when you foliar feed in the same way it does in the soil? Are you feeding photomag to the soil too?


Thanks

Tag

I amended heavily with gypsum btw.... so the Ca and S values are certainly much different now.. If I remember correctly if I went too hard the Ca could have pushed out some K in the base saturation...?