Effectiveness of organo-mineral fertilizer EcoGrow application in potato growing

Abstract

The studies conducted with silicon-containing preparations in various regions of the Russian Federation on field crops and potatoes were analyzed. Due to the revealed positive effect, the goal was set to study the technology of using the organo-mineral fertilizer EcoGrow with active silicon in potato agrocenosis. The research was carried out in the fields of the farm of the OAO Saturn-2 in the Pervomayskiy District of the Altai Region. The application of EcoGrow for tuber treatment before planting potatoes (the Gala variety) at a rate of 6 L t and as a foliar dressing during the germination and budding stage at a rate of 3 L ha helped to increase the supply of soil with mobile nutrients including sulfur in the 0-20 cm layer and the level of nitrogen and potassium accumulation especially when dressing at the budding stage. Increased total biogenesity of chernozem was revealed from 22.50 to 1.48-17.67 million CFU (colony-forming units) with the highest value when treating tubers before planting. The maximum coefficient of mineralization of organic residues of 1.54 was obtained from treating tubers followed by twofold foliar dressing during the growing season. The number of tubers per plant increased from 9.51 to 15.39-17.12 pieces. At that time, the number of small-sized tubers increased from 3.9 to 8.27-9.37 pieces; the number of medium-sized tubers increased from 2.97 to 4.45-5.64 pieces. The number of tubers in the fraction over 120 g increased only when foliar dressing at the budding stage. The weight of 1 tuber in the dressing variants was in the range of 105.3-131.1 g, with 91.7 g in the control. The yield increased from 38.19 t ha to 43.06-53.23 t ha or by 12.6-39.38% with the maximum value from tuber treatment followed by foliar dressing at the budding stage. The content of dry solids, starch and vitamin C was the highest when treating tubers + foliar dressing at the budding stage followed by twofold foliar dressing: respectively, 20.6-20.5% compared to 19.0%; 10.9-11.8% compared to 9.9% and 10.1-13.4 mg% compared to 11.0 mg%.