Jere White is the savvy owner of White Forest Nursery. I met him there while asking them to participate in our WOW! Challenge. But it was his nursery manager, Joe, who watched as I poured on the WOW! Microminerals for the Wow! Challenge at his nursery in Bakersfield, California. Fifteen days later I returned for the second act of the WOW! Challenge. I had applied a half gallon of mixture to each of 12 plants with 2 plants set aside as a control set aside as controls. All the plants were non producing roses. Now I was back.
I invited Jere out to the stock area to view the results. On all of the treated plants were new shoot starts even in the cold winter weather with nights in the low 40's and one of the plants had two new flower buds about a day away from blossom. On the non-WOW!ed plants, nothing.
Jere remarked, "Now that's impressive! This is the hardest time of the year to show that a new product works. I would imagine that in the spring you would get even better results."
Jere and I chatted about why WOW! works like it does. The results come from the fact that the plants were starving for nutrients. I think of ailing plants as my patients.
"You can't just get them to stick their tongue out to look down their throats, but just like us, if we don't get our essential minerals we get sick, too. These roses were sick, that's all, now they are getting better."
Jere is a bio-chemist with a Masters degree from Stanford University, and a long background with the technical experience to diagnose and solve most disease, insect and growing problems. White Forest has been a landmark in Bakersfield for a long time now. He remarked, "Well, we have been trying to figure out the right amount of micro minerals for some time, but usually to get the plants to respond we end up putting on an amount that produces a toxicity in the soil."
"I knew exactly what he meant; that is one of the barriers I looked at when I determined how to produce WOW! in the first place. That's because the amount normally applied before our product was available was a powder and only a portion is bio available - ionic, then over time the massive amount released by the large particles results in toxicity. It's not the amount, its the particle size. You probably notice that there is not much weight by volume in our product, but there are trillions more atoms available because of the particle size." I said.
"Avogadro number..." Jere replied.
I nodded. "Thats right, a mole of any element is 6 X 10 to the 23rd atoms. So by delivering a smaller amount of a mineral nutrient, at the ionic size, the plants can take their medicine, and not get sick from too much."
"Well, it looks like the spring application will work wonders, let's try it on a lot of our starts and seedlings, and if we like it we will be happy to be your advocate for WOW!"
I responded. "And that's just in 15 days, let's see what they look like in another 15!"
Look for the next report then and remember that NOW is the time to treat your soil to be ready for spring planting.
Getting to know Jere and White Forest has been a real pleasure for me; White Forest Nursery is the kind of place that wants plants, and people, to prosper. A good thing.
Stillwater is a freelance writer who hates injustice and corruption in any form but especially injustice and corruption paid for by American taxpayers. She has recently published a book entitled, "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket: Helpful Tips For Touring Today's Middle East". According to Ms. Stillwater, "It's a fabulous and entertaining book. I loved writing it. And I hope that you will love reading it too." It's available at http://www.amazon.com/Bring-Your-Own-Flak-Jacket/dp/0978615719 or you can special order it at any independent bookstore.
WOW is a registered trademark for an organic pre-emergent weed control and lawn fertilizer sold by Gardens Alive! The folks selling this product had better change the name quick before they get sued.
by
Bill Samuel (4 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 330 comments)
on Sunday, March 9, 2008 at 4:30:53 PM
I can't find the e-mail that the owner of WOW! Microminerals sent me explaining all this legal stuff to me but I think the word "Wow" is generic or something. In any case, I know that the owner researched it before naming his product and it all appears to be kosher. But thanks for your concern.
by
Jane Stillwater (454 articles, 0 quicklinks, 9 diaries, 62 comments)
on Sunday, March 9, 2008 at 6:25:38 PM
2 comments
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