APTUS & Mineralization
Growing Plants Beyond Basic Bulk Bags
These days when walking into a store, all of the product is gleaming under the lights. It’s colorful, uniform in size, looks crisp, and quite appealing as you walk up to the products’ shelves. It’s grown the world over with the same fertilizer programs supplemented to reach adequate levels of 14 essential fertilizer elements and typically, absolutely nothing else. The lead up is great but when you go to consume the product, its bland, has the same base flavor, and nothing memorable is experienced despite the look. The experience is summed up in, “it gets the job done”.
Now if you’re wondering whether the above paragraph references produce at the grocery store or commercially produced cannabis and hemp products, is there really a difference? Both suffer from a key benefit that Aptus Plant Tech products provide and that is heightened mineralization allowing the growth of premium, affordable end products.
What are Basic Bulk Bags (BBB)?
Basic bulk bags (BBB) are factory blended sacks of dry blended fertilizer powder. Nearly all companies on the market order these ingredients from relatively few central manufacturers which filter down to labels marketing themselves as fertilizer manufacturers but are in fact not. They’re simply just bagging these blends that closely resemble commercial tomato or greenhouse blends which contain the same ingredients, run nearly at the same EC, and produce the same “it does the job” result as their food-use counterparts.
Why do BBB products all produce the same result?
To understand the uniform but somewhat empty result gained with BBB, it's important to understand how these elements’ worth was decided. In the early 20th century, it was established that there are 14 essential elements to be given through fertilizer, 3 that are taken by the plant from the environment, and a further 3 elements deemed beneficial but not necessary for a plant to complete its life cycle.
|
Elements Given through Fertilizer |
Elements Taken from Environment |
Considered Beneficial but Not Essential |
|
Nitrogen (N), Phosphorus (P), Potassium (K), Calcium (Ca), Magnesium (Mg), Sulfur (S), Boron (B), Chlorine (Cl), Iron (Fe), Manganese (Mn), Copper (Cu), Zincz (Zn), Molybdenum (Mb), and Nickel (Ni) |
Hydrogen (H), Carbon (C) and Oxygen (O) |
Cobalt (Co), Sodium (Na), and Silica (Si) |
These elements collectively make up the described 17 essential elements for plant growth.The very criteria for establishing it as officially essential is based solely on the plant completing its life cycle and NOT the mineral density or overall quality of the end products.
Can plants use more minerals than what’s supplied in BBB?
Yes they can! In fact, just by adding Aptus Fasilitor which is an exclusive formula of immediately available silica (Si) to the plant, we saw the following effects through testing plant sap (notice the huge increases across the board in elemental content!):
|
Parameters |
Before | After | Result |
| Brix | 2,3 | 4,6 | +100% |
| Ec | 20 | 15 | -25% |
| pH | 5,8 | 5,9 | +2% |
| Ca | 590 | 1900 | +222% |
| Mg | 95 | 275 | +189% |
| Fe | 2,8 | 4,1 | +46% |
| Mn | 3 | 8 |
+166% |
| K | 10400 | 6200 |
-40% |
| B | 1.3 | 4,5 |
+246% |
| Mo | 0.1 | 0.3 |
+200% |
A 100% increase in BRIX (plant sugar content) along with over a 100% increase in calcium, magnesium, manganese, boron, and molybdenum. Smaller increases in iron and a decrease of excess potassium was also noted. This is just from adding one product designed to operate outside of what’s deemed essential. Plants can turn up to 90+ elements from inorganic to organic forms within their tissue depending on the species. How much mineral density (and quality) are you leaving on the table by just going by what’s “essential”?
These trace minerals outside of the 17 essential elements when available to the plant provide the ingredients necessary to catalyze enzymatic processes resulting in increased terpene & flavonoid production, quality, and shelf life.
Have more complete feeds been shown to increase quality and shelf life?
Yes, they certainly have! Aptus Plant Tech utilizes ingredients that provide a wider variety of trace minerals than BBB products. For example when supplying nitrogen (N), select Aptus offerings utilize protein hydrolysate which digests plant matter and encapsulates it with many trace minerals and compounds intact. This amino acid rich compound provides lush growth and nutrition to the plant displaying exaggerated growth of lush, healthy tissue. No excess nitrates leads to healthier and more well-balanced tissue in end products at harvest. Look below to see how Aptus products affect the integrity of plant cells at a microscopic level:
Shelf life test on strawberries grown with and without Aptus biostimulants
Healthier plant tissue formed with a wider variety of trace minerals and the silica from Aptus Fasilitor makes an observable difference all the way down to the cell.
Sounds nice but isn't feeding better just too expensive?
It isn’t! Overall at just an average cost of $0.27 per litre of finished solution and $0.48 once a week foliar spraying utilizing the Aptus CLEAN PROGRAM, you’re on your way to experiencing quality results at a fantastic price cheaper than most liquid programs on the market.
What components in Aptus products improve quality over BBB?
-
Hydrolysate provides L amino acids, protein base nitrogen, trace minerals, and various compounds that lead to lush, healthy tissue growth containing a higher concentration of elements than control-grown BBB products
- Silicic acid from the exclusive plant-available silicon in Fasilitor has been shown in studies to increase mineral content in plant tissue in some cases by over 100%
- Dedicated potassium supplementation without excess phosphorus allows for clean, thick, heavy, and high quality flowers to develop
