Be the Seed

You can go without water for a time, or without food for a time, and even survive colder or hotter weather for a time, but the one thing you need constantly, is oxygen. Both humans and germinating seed use a biochemical process called respiration to survive and grow. During respiration, both humans and germinating seed take in oxygen, and then release carbon dioxide. Without oxygen to drive the respiration process, you would die or quickly be damaged. Just like you, a germinating seed will also die or quickly be damaged if it does not have available oxygen.

Avoid Death and Damage

As a seed pellet takes in soil moisture, water fills the pore spaces in the pellet and pushes out the available air. Under drier, non-saturated soil conditions, oxygen is not totally pushed out of the pellet, so oxygen is usually available to the seed. When the pellet is fully saturated for a short period of time, as might be the case during irrigation, available oxygen may be lacking. Germination problems may arise in this situation, especially if the seed is additionally stressed by other environmental conditions such as hot or cold temperatures. So…how do you make a seed pellet that provides maximum amounts of oxygen, even when the soil environment is not perfect?

What “Pelleting Nerds” Know

Three things;

1. Select pelleting materials that come together to form a pellet with a lot of pore space (60% is good).

2. Include a water repelling or “hydrophobic” material in the pellet materials mix. When a pellet is saturated with water, a particle of water repelling material will form something like an “air bubble” around itself. The air inside this “bubble” can be used by the seed when saturation occurs.

3. A pellet that splits open like an egg is always good. When a pellet splits apart, it opens the pellet up to oxygen, but also eliminates any physical obstruction to root growth. A root may be able to more easily move into soil because it doesn’t have to push through the pelleting material.

Harris Moran’s New OptiCoat Pellets

Harris Moran has three new pellets in their new OptiCoat pellet series:

• a light density pellet with a weight increase of about 18 to 1,

• a medium density pellet with a weight increase of about 27 to 1, and

• a heavy density pellet with a weight increase of about 35 to 1.

These pellets have high porosity, hydrophobic particles mixed in, and all split open for optimum performance under most environmental conditions.

Click HERE to learn more about the new OptiCoat pellet series

Well, that’s all for now.
See you next time, when we talk about “Seed Pathology and Disinfection…Keeping it Clean”.

 
Talk to you then.