Yunpeng worked with his faculty advisor, Elizabeth Wheat, to design and implement an experiment on the farm using different fertilizers. Read more!

Goal: The purpose of this experiment is to examine whether using a combination of three organic fertilizers, kelp meal, blood meal, and crab meal is more effective than only using a single dose of Bio·Bloom™.

Subject: The plant we chose for this particular experiment is kale. Kale has a relatively short growth period, which usually takes from 30 to 40 days. The growth of kale could be significantly affected by the amount of nutrients that are available in the soil. The kale plants will be transplanted from soil blocks to the experiment site once the bed is prepared. Each plant will be spaced approximately 8 inches apart.  Each experiment group will include at least three plants and there will be at least three replicates on each row.

 Control:  The control group will be kales that are planted with the addition of Bio·Bloom™.

 Variable: The Variable in this experiment will be kale plants that are treated with a mixture of organic fertilizers consisting of Kelp meal, Blood meal, and Crab meal.

 Site: Due to the spread of club root at the CUH farm, no plants from the Brassica family can be planted there. The experiment will take place at Mercer court. An empty bed without any history of diseases will be selected and prepared for optimal growing conditions. The bed will be tilled and prepared with compost before applying any fertilizers. The bed is normally 20 feet-long and 2 feet wide.

 Data collection: Growth of the plants will be measured and compared every two days. A spreadsheet will be created to record all the data necessary.

Measurements will include: 

-Height of the plants

-Number of leaves

-Size of leaves

-Colors of leaves

-Amount of pests

-Symptoms for diseases and virus

What I’ve found most interesting so far: Plants are like humans; curing them with pesticides, and chemical products does not make them healthier. Almost every disease and and pest problem is due to lack of a certain nutrient. So if we find out what is lacking, we can simply buff the plants with nutrients without using any pesticide/herbicide at all!