Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Application of Active EM-Calcium in Green Agricultural Production — Case Study in Tomato and…
http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/58329
0.6℃,-1.0℃ higher than the same period in recent years. Peak temperature was 37.9℃
recording on July 29
th
. The experimental soil properties were as follows: organic matter
14.34 g kg
-1
, available nitrogen 104.17 ppm, available phosphorus 26.48 ppm, available
potassium 184.70 ppm.
2.1.2. Experimental design
Lab experiment: 28 g lime was accurately weighed in a 100 ml volumetric flask, then added
DI water to dissolve and kept constant volume to 1000 ml, and the 2% Ca
2+
suspension was
available by shaking the mixture well. Then the prepared calcium suspension was mixed with
different volume EM, molasses (EM and the molasses were supported by EMRO Limited
Company, Nanjing Branch) and DI water to make up 5 treatments with three replications. The
ingredients of treatment T1-T5 were displayed as Table 1. These sealed EM-Calcium mixtures
would be fermented for 3-6 days in a orbital shaker with constant temperature, they were taken
out and setted aside when the precipitates were basically dissolved. The fermented treatment
with highest calcium solubility was diluted to keep the active EM-calcium solution with 2.0‰
Ca
2+
concentration.
2% Ca
2+
suspension (ml)
Theoretical Ca
2+
concentration
Treatment
EM (ml)
Molasses (ml)
DI water (ml)
T1
45
25
25
205
3.0‰
T2
60
30
30
180
4.0‰
T3
75
40
40
145
5.0‰
T4
90
45
45
120
6.0‰
T5
105
50
50
95
7.0‰
Table 1.
The components of EM-calcium solution with different contents.
Field experiment: the six week old tomato seedlings (“
21
st
Century Crown
”) were transplanted
to the experiment fields on June 7
th
, conventional field management were carried out fairly
among the treatments, no additional light, heat, or CO
2
were provided. The experimental field
was ploughed several times and fertilized with 700kg hm
-2
compound fertilizer (N: P
2
O
5
:
K
2
O=1:2:2) in May. Irrigation systems for tomato were accorded with the local farming
practices. At 8:30 every morning, micro sprayers were adopted to spray the active EM-calcium
solutions 2 ml once in four days on different tomato organs. The treatments were set based on
the sprayed organs, including spraying root, spraying flower, spraying leaves near the
newborn fruits, spraying one week old fruit, spraying three week old fruit, and a control,
hereafter referred as SR, SF, SL, SO, ST and CK respectively. A plastic film was used to keep
apart the other parts when spraying one tomato organ.
