Granular Garden Soil Inoculant

Granular Garden Soil Inoculant is designed to improve yields for legume vegetable crops including English peas, bush beans, pole beans, and lima beans. It will also improve the nitrogen-fixing ability of legume cover crops like clover, chickpeas and sunn hemp. This formulation is in a granular, easy-to-use form that can simply be sprinkled on top of your garden soil and lightly incorporated. To apply, simply sprinkle the granules along the row with the seed being planted. See usage rates below.

Granular Garden Soil Inoculant places enhance bacteria populations in the soil to help nitrogen-fixing plants fix more nitrogen. Each package contains billions of live bacteria that are essential to the nitrogen-fixing process of vegetable and cover crop plants. The bacteria work to actively convert atmospheric nitrogen into a usable form for the plant. This allows vegetable plants to make their own nitrogen, and allows cover crops to increase the amount of stored nitrogen that is available to the following vegetable crop.

Legume plants have the unique ability to fix atmospheric nitrogen by means of bacteria which live in symbiosis on the nodules of their roots. There are numerous species of these bacteria and each has the ability to nodulate different host plants. This distribution over the seed will ensure effective nodulation and thus the process of nitrogen fixation by the host plant.

An inoculant has selected strains of nitrogen fixing bacteria mixed with a peat humus carrier. The granular inoculant is sprinkled into the seed row of garden legumes. When the bacteria are deposited into the soil, they begin to multiply. As the seed sprouts, plant roots grow into the soil. Eventually the introduced bacteria come in contact with a plant root. There is an infection termed a nodule. The nodule is colonized by the bacteria and nitrogen fixation begins.

Benefits of Using Inoculants:

• Fertilizer savings: Due to the nitrogen-fixing ability of legumes inoculated with rhizobia, the need for commercial nitrogen fertilizer is virtually eliminated.
• Higher yields: All legumes have higher yields when properly nodulated, which increases total production.
• Effectiveness of rhizobia strains: Rhizobia can become lazy over time and fix less nitrogen even though they remain good nodulators. Continuous use of fresh rhizobia will maximize yield benefits, as these rhizobia will out-compete the indigenous rhizobia for root nodulation.
• Added nitrogen to the soil: Properly nodulated legumes add 55 to 300 pounds of nitrogen per acre to soil. The exact amount depends on effectiveness of the nitrogen fixation process, type of legume, length of time grown, soil nutrient levels, and the nitrogen already available.
• Benefits rotated crops: Nitrogen provided by inoculated legumes grown in crop rotation helps boost yield and lower fertilizer costs for corn.
  Economical and safe: Inoculation is a low cost way to ensure nodulation with the proper strain of nitrogen-fixing rhizobia bacteria for increased yield in an environmentally safe manner.

Granular Garden Soil Inoculant Usage Rates:

• For smaller gardens, use 1 teaspoon of Granular Garden Soil Inoculant per 2′ of row.
• The 2.3 oz bag is approximately enough for a 35′ row.
• For larger applications, the 8.7 ounce shaker can will inoculate 150′ feet of garden row.
• Using that ratio, half the shaker can (4.35 oz) would be enough for a 75′ row.

Granular Garden Soil Inoculant expires year to year. Expired material may not be viable.