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  • From: Mildred Martin <Milly@ap.net>
  • To: saralein@unity.ncsu.edu, swolf@arnica.csustan.edu, web@arnarb.harvard.edu, dlw@unlinfo.unl.edu, permaculture@sunsite.unc.edu, webmaster@sunsite.unc.edu, govjlc01@asc.edu, adtodd@syr.edu, p-sittler@tamu.edu, majordomo@tardis.union.edu
  • Subject: Reversing Plant Aging
  • Date: Thu, 9 Jul 1998 22:01:22 -0700 (PDT)


Keeping Your Flowers and Trees Growing and Blooming Longer

When plants age, they stop growing and flowering, and their leaves stop
making protein and
chlorophyll. Eventually the leaves turn yellow and fall off, and the plants
become susceptible to
fungal (rust) infections and insect attack. Plant aging or senescence is a
biochemical process that is
highly susceptible to environmental conditions. It can easily be stopped by
plant hormones, either
made by the plants themselves or by soil microorganisms. If your roses stop
flowering after two
months, your plants are either aging prematurely, or they are not receiving
enough light. The aging
process of plants can be slowed dramatically by gardeners who understand why
plants "shut down"
biochemically. Plants can grow in a bucket of rocks if they are fed chemical
fertilizers that contain
water-soluble minerals. Unfortunately for plants, most minerals in the soil
are not water-soluble. This
means that most plant growth is controlled by soil microorganisms that break
down organic matter
into simple molecules that the plants can use. Although plants can make their
own vitamins and
amino acids, they can also take them up from the soil if microorganisms
"pre-process" them first.
Becoming a successful gardener does not require a degree in botany or
horticulture, but it does
require some knowledge of plant nutrition and how plants grow in response to
their natural
environment. This knowledge is freely available, but it is generally "locked
up" in the scientific
literature in a form that is not readily understandable to the average
person. I know all about
"science speak". My name is Dr. Stephen Martin and I am Chief Scientist of
Wyoming DnaVaccine,
LLC. I am responsible for the design and development of vaccines against the
HIV, and hepatitis
B/C viruses, animal and human herpes viruses, and the TB bacterium
(http://www.wyomdnavaccine.com). In an effort to keep sane, I adopted organic
gardening as my
passion about 6 years ago. Since that time, I have become very knowledgeable
about plant
nutrition and the physiology of plant cell growth regulation. I intend to
share that knowledge,
translated into understandable English, with others. I am starting a WEB site
in about two months
called Milly's Gourmet Organics. Milly is my 76 year-old mother, an avid
gardener, and my business
partner in this enterprise. The site will include useful information about
all commercial and non-
commercial fertilizers and how they can or cannot affect plant growth. Of
particular interest will be a
discussion of "Potting Soil" and why most commercial brands, in and of
themselves, provide very
few nutrients for plants. The site will also include recipes that I developed
for making "bug juice", a
non-odorous concoction of soil bacteria and easily obtained household items
such as cornstarch,
fruit and yeast that will make your plants grow and flower beyond your
wildest expectations. If you
want to be put on the mailing list, please send your request to milly@ap.net.
In the interim, please
bear with me. I have an interesting story to tell.

In my mother's garden, the soil is 50% clay. When she moved to her present
house, the lawn was
sparse, and obviously dying. We ripped it up. It wasn't worth saving. We
planted roses and
numerous other plants, but they never did well. The soil conditions are
barely suitable for the growth
of even the hardiest of plants. About five years ago, a friend gave me a few
pounds of high-grade
fish meal for making soups and stocks. On a whim, I put one tablespoon of the
meal in one gallon of
water and fed it to my mother's sickly rose bushes. The results were apparent
within weeks. Milly's
roses started growing and budding to an extent that is difficult to believe.
The roses now bloom 8
months of the year, the leaves are lush green, and there is very little rust
even though my mother
lives on the edge of a fog belt. Surprisingly, there have been no aphid
infestations since the fish
meal was first fed to the roses. I treated her sick apple and pear trees in
the same manner. Both
trees were sparsely foliated with little fruit, the leaves were yellow and
covered with rust, and the fruit
was small, spotted with fungus and worm-ridden. My mother was going to have
both trees removed.
One year later, after applying 4 gallons of the fish meal slurry to the base
of the trees, both trees are
lush green with foliage and have more fruit that any ten families could
possibly use. There is no rust,
and the fruit is completely worm-free. A plumb tree that was planted 5 years
ago as a small bare root
sapling is now over 12 feet tall, and has so many plumbs that the limbs of
the tree sag under the
weight. The lower limbs touch the ground. It took me awhile to find out why
fish meal, per se, is such
a good fertilizer at such low concentrations. The answer turned out to be
more complicated than I
originally thought.

First, this fish meal works as a fertilizer because it is actually a human
food product. It consists of
fresh whole fish that are either too small to be filleted or the wrong
species. The fish are processed
within 8 hours of harvesting in order to preserve freshness. The rapid
cooking process stops the
ammonification process, and other natural degradation processes that occur
when a fish or animal
dies. The intense steam heat stops the enzymatic breakdown of the fish organs
and preserves the
integrity of the plant growth factors in the meal. These growth factors, and
the vitamins that are
present in high concentrations in fish organs, are heat stable. The enzymes
that break down growth
factors into simpler compounds are not. The potency of the fish meal as a
fertilizer has nothing to do
with its high protein content. If that were true, chicken manure would
probably work just as well. It
doesn't. Manure does not contain these molecules because they are absorbed
out of an animal or
bird's food in their digestive tracts. In time, I found that the growth
factors were actually precursors
or biochemical building blocks for the group of plant hormones called auxins
and cytokinins. Auxins
control root growth and the elongation (not growth) of individual plant
cells. Cytokinins stimulate
plant cell growth, the synthesis of protein and chlorophyll, and induce
budding and flowering.
Cytokinins also stimulate the synthesis of molecules in plant leaves, stems
and roots that protect
plants from fungal and insect attacks. Auxins and cytokinins work together to
stop plant aging or
senescense. Plants can make these hormones internally, but the hormones can
also be made by a
wide diversity of soil bacteria and fungi. When the hormones are secreted
into the root zone by
microorganisms, the plants will continue to grow and senescence will be
postponed until the
weather becomes harsh. The fish meal does not contain preformed auxins or
cytokinins, but it does
contain very high concentrations of molecules that can be rapidly turned into
these hormones by soil
microorganisms. When I planted Milly's roses, I packed the roots in fresh
compost. Fresh compost
contains a large number of microorganisms that break down organic matter, but
not all organic
matter is equally useful as a fertilizer. When fed the fish meal, the
microorganisms produced plant
growth hormones, and the rest is history. Plant compost does not contain
these molecules because
growth hormones are unstable and are not stored in plant tissues. They are
naturally degraded very
soon after they are made. High concentrations of auxins and cytokinins also
block the activity of the
plant enzymes that make the hormones in the plant cells. This natural
feedback prevents plants from
growing too vigorously. We can get around this "natural block" by inducing
bacteria and fungi to
make the auxins and cytokinins for the plants in the soil. After much
experimentation, I found that
bakers yeast, fed a diet of sugar and fish meal, also makes cytokinins. A
recipe for a simple, yet
potent "bug juice" fertilizer will be included in the forthcoming Milly's
Gourmet Organics WEB site.

Milly's Gourmet Organics is a company that presently sells only MaxGro, a
100% Certified Organic
Fertilizer, e.g. the fish meal I've been talking about in this message. It
is mixed with freshly cooked
crab shell waste in order to increase the calcium concentration (very
important for plants), and to
reduce the cost of the fertilizer. Also, the chitin in the crabshell
stimulates soil organisms to secrete
enzymes called chitinases. These enzymes degrade chitin, which is a component
of nematode and
flea egg shells. The presence of chitin in the fertilizer makes it a natural
biopesticide that is non-toxic
to birds, animals, fish, and plants. This fertilizer is 30% protein, 6%
nitrogen, 4% phosphorus, 0.6%
potash, and 14% calcium. One pound will make 25 to 100 gallons of a
water-based fertilizer slurry.
The exact concentration of fish meal needed will depend on the health of your
plants. MaxGro is
sold in one pound bags for $12.95 (plus $.98 cents sales tax for CA
residents) plus $3.00 for
shipping by priority mail. Only US orders containing checks or money orders
can be accepted until
the WEB site is functional in a month or so. MasterCard/Visa and
international orders will be
accepted when ordering through the WEB site. We are discounting MaxGro now in
order to more
accurately guage consumer interest. Fish meal is only available seasonally so
we must contract in
advance with the processing plant. By ordering now, you are helping us more
accurately plan for
the future. In the future, we will also be selling dried, purified soil
bacterial preparations that can be
used to supplement the bacteria already in the soil. These bacteria are not
genetically engineered,
but they are superior in their ability to break down plant proteins,
starches, cellulose and pectin in
the soil. I've isolated these bugs from some of the finest compost piles on
the West Coast. ("You
design vaccines for a living and crawl around compost piles for a hobby?").
If you don't have a
compost pile-for example if you live in an apartment or condo-you will need
to spike the bug juice I
described earlier with superior soil bacteria in order to improve the growth
of your house or patio
plants. As soon as we can afford a $250,000 fermentor, we will prepare the
bacterial strains for sale
to the public.

Orders can be sent to Milly's Organics, 265 Spanish Flag, Sonoma, CA 95476.
Email is milly@ap.net.
Please make checks out to Milly's and allow 2 weeks after the receipt of your
order for delivery.

Thanks for your patience and happy gardening. Oh, one more thing. If you ever
meet an arrogant,
know-it-all person who is totally full of him/hershelf, remind he/she that
plants can make all their own
vitamins, sugars and amino acids and live on CO2, sunshine and soil minerals.
Animals can't. So, in
a very real biochemical sense, plants are superior organisms or "beings" to
humans-at least some
humans.

Milly and Steve



  • Reversing Plant Aging, Mildred Martin, 07/10/1998

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