June 2022 - 18

DUETS
greenhouse sections to be
managed as monoculture
production units. This allows for
dedicated environment control,
pest management and labor. It
also allows for individualized
crop nutrition management. How
is the soluble fertilizer market
integrating with this?
Rick: I really can't say for
sure how the fertilizer market
is integrating into the trend per
se. But I can tell you that if I
was a grower who had an entire
greenhouse of one or similar plant
types, I'd have a system that
delivered the right nutrients at the
right time at the right amounts
and ratios to drive growth and
quality. I think the tools are out
there but it just has to be in a system
that growers can recognize and
embrace. Other technologies like drip
irrigation and control technologies
will foster this movement.
With that being said, the fertilizer
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industry needs to package the
components so that nutritional recipes
can be easily varied and obtained
with the know-how and instructions
to help the grower understand and
implement. I can tell you that at
Hawthorne Gardening Co. we are
doing just that. It's really an exciting
time, Peter. We are at a point where
we have the technologies and tools to
grow plants in a more controlled and
sustainable way - at Hawthorne, we
call that Hawthorne 360.
Peter: I observe this monoculture
versus many-culture reality play out
at different extremes of operational
size. Plenty of ink is spent on
following trends for large-scale
horticulture, but how is soluble
fertilizer use adapting to smaller size
operations that will never achieve the
operational scale described above?
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Rick: Exactly. The challenge is
when you are trying to grow a wide
variety of plant types, sizes and
forms, but it also depends on what
you consider small. Even smaller
operations can justify installing two
or three injectors together to deliver
a nutrient solution that is generally
acceptable to a wide variety of plant
types. Look at how you are using
multiple injectors in your relatively
small research greenhouse.
I realize this article is about water
soluble fertilizers but when it comes
to nutritional programs, it's not
always up to what is in the liquid
fertilizer program. You can then
use granularly applied controlledrelease
fertilizers to augment those
plants that may need more nutrients
such as large containers, perennials
or hanging baskets. Advances in
coating technologies have made this
approach a great way to go.
Peter: That's a great point to end
on today; let's return to discuss it in
depth soon. Thanks for sharing your
insight, Rick.
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June 2022

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of June 2022
