The MGS Forum
Gardening in mediterranean climates => General Cultivation => Topic started by: Marilyn on July 30, 2013, 07:37:37 PM
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I used this product earlier in the year as a booster for some transplanted shrubs and other bits and pieces, with very intriguing results. Siapton is an apparently organic liquid fertilizer, with the usual mixture of NPK and micronutrients, plus aminoacids which, according to the Swiss agriculture specialist who originally put me on to it, "really activates" the plant's growth systems. Well, it certainly did that; all the transplants (mostly subtropical shrubs e.g. plumbago, Cestrum, Clerodendrum ugandense etc, plus some rose bushes) put oodles of new growth on in the weeks following treatment.
The interesting side-effect was that scores of seeds germinated in the ground - unfortunately, the majority of them were seeds from the old lawn, which I had weedkilled and ploughed out! Nothing an afternoon's pulling didn't solve, but could have done without it. On the other hand, the wee petunia, the daturas and various other surprises were very welcome. Here, a couple of photos of what turned up - from top to bottom, a white datura; dianthus that I put in as a cutting on the offchance and was rewarded with a burst of flower; the "re-seeded" grass!, the dear petunia, and a plumbago which was 3 inch tall bare twigs in April.
I would be interested to know if anyone else has had similar experience with this product and whether in fact it can be used as a germination aid (not something it is advertised for, on the bottle at least!)
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Prompted by your fascinating tale of unexpected germinations, I found that this paper (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC181280/) published in 2003 in the Journal of the American Society of Plant Physiologists does suggest that amino acids and peptides (perhaps of the sort contained in Siapton) could indeed play an important part in germination!
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Thanks, Alisdair, for sharing that! Interesting stuff indeed. As someone still more or less at the early stages of a career in horticulture, I always find it a comfort to remember there is still so much to discover about the world of plants. I am always reassured that I will never be bored! :)