So much silicon research I can't keep up with it all
I was searching the Turfgrass Information File for ’turfgrass quality rating’ and a couple interesting silicon/silica/silicate projects appeared in the results.
The first one, Fortification of Potassium Silicate With Compost Tea and Seaweed Extract for the Management of Dollar Spot of Turfgrass by Manoharan, I’ll summarize with this quote: “this study did not effectively control the dollar spot disease severity.”
The second one is The Effects of Silicon Applications on Wear and Drought Stress of Cool Season Turfgrass by Badzmierowski and Sullivan. The results section starts with “No significant differences were observed among treatments throughout the duration of the trial.”
For more reading about Si and turfgrass, the articles with the quotes below are a fun place to start.
- “The significance of ’not significant’” by Nikolai.
- “no influence on mean vigor/growth, canopy density, canopy color, or wear/traffic tolerance of a creeping bentgrass fairway over a 2-year period” by Schlossberg and Pruyne.
- “calcium silicate application may exacerbate brown patch disease incidence” by Zhang et al.
- “In 11 attempts, Si failed to increase green speed every single time” in which I wrote about a project by Guertal.