I was listening to NPR this morning in the car, a program called The People's Pharmacy. They were discussing the pharmacological use of cornmeal to treat fungal infections. The called who introduced the topic mentioned that he also uses cornmeal worked into the soil around his roses to prevent blackspot. Has anyone heard of this before? What about cornmeal as a preventative to other fungal diseases?
Don't know about the cornmeal, but blended up banana peels do wonders for roses. Banana peels don't seem to get rid of black spot, but they do produce some healthy looking leaves and flowers.
Still haven't figured out where black spot comes from, how it gets to where it gets.
Doing a search through google turns up quite a few links about it. I searched:
cornmeal roses
Hope that helps. And thanks for the suggestion!
-- Jim Carlock Please post replies to newsgroup.
"Jacqueline Cahoon" wrote: I was listening to NPR this morning in the car, a program called The People's Pharmacy. They were discussing the pharmacological use of cornmeal to treat fungal infections. The called who introduced the topic mentioned that he also uses cornmeal worked into the soil around his roses to prevent blackspot. Has anyone heard of this before? What about cornmeal as a preventative to other fungal diseases?
around
No. Why would it work?
Blackspot is spread by spores that overwinter on the plant as well as in the ground.
J. Del Col
snipped-for-privacy@mail.ab.edu replied:
The research on cornmeal was done by the Texas A&M Research Station in Stephenville. Dr. Joe McFarland headed that work before his retirement. The discovery of cornmeal¹s fungal disease control came about by noticing the peanut crops. Under research observation at the research center these crops didn¹t have fungal diseases when they followed the corn planting in rotation. Lab tests related to that later discovered the beneficial organisms in cornmeal were as effective or more than chemical fungicides at shutting down fungal diseases. That¹s why we now recommend it for use on brown patch in St. Augustine grass, damping off in seedlings, black spot on roses and many other fungal diseases.
Also Dr. Nick Christian¹s staff at Iowa State University discovered the use of corn gluten meal for use as a natural weed and feed. Time to put it out right now before weed seed germination, at 15-20 lbs. per 1,000 square feet.
around
The Stephenville A&M Research & Extension Center discovered fungus-fighting properties in cornmeal, but not for application directly to any plant; rather it is applied to soil. Several additional studies have extended this research, mainly for use in developing organic food crops (peanuts, potatos, soybeans, cucumbers, etc) for fighting crop pathogens without chemical intervention. Much of what has been discovered has obvious applicability to ornamental gardening, though gardeners have misunderstood some of it..
400 to 800 pounds of cornmeal is applied to each acre of soil (or ten to twenty pounds per 1000 square feet). The cornmeal when wetted by normal irrigation (or rainfall) begins to feed beneficial microorganisms & especially helpful mycoparasite Trichoderma spp, which are mycoparasites, meaning helpful fungi that parasitize & feed upon pathogenic fungi such as Sclerotinia (Stalk Rot), Sclerotium (tropical stem rot), Aspergillis nigre (black mold), & Rhizoctonia solani (black scurf, lower-stem decay, & root-rot). Cornmeal application directly to leaves has no effect, but changing the nutrient content of the soil to enhance positive microorganisms does.This method restrains harmful funguses from getting started & works best in purely organic growing conditions, by encouraging beneficial funguses. If fungicidal chemicals are also being applied to plants, that defeats the value of the cornmeal since fungicides also discourage beneficial fungi.
Misunderstanding rumors of this research has led to many on-line discussions of cornmeal to control blackspot or to be dusted over plants afflicted with any kind of mildew or fungus. Mostly these discussions are ill informed & come close to being garden myths. Yet there is good reason to speculate that cornmeal added to the soil may help prevent ALL harmful soil-born funguses, including such things as oak wilt & possibly blackspot before it gets to the roses, even though the evidence isn't all in. It certainly causes no harm to try it as a blackspot preventative in the soil, since cornmeal has no negative side-effects & even functions as a tepid fertilizer, & ANYthing that replaces the use of fungicides will help beneficial funguses do their natural work of improving the overall health of a garden.
-paghat the ratgirl
Corn meal nourishes several different beneficial fungi and other organisms in the soil which combat the harmful pathogens. There is a lot of research out there to prove this, so a simple search will bring you to it.
Need a good, cheap, knowledge expanding present for yourself or a friend?
well I found a source of the corn gluten meal at a local feed store. 12.25 per
50 lb bag and have started putt>Also Dr. Nick Christian¹s staff at Iowa State University discovered the~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ List Manager: Puregold Goldfish List at
That's nice, Ingrid, but it takes 40-50 lb. of corn gluten per 1,000 square feet to control weeds, and the stuff is 11% nitrogen. Do you really want 4 or 5 lbs of N on your lawn?
juneau snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com (Grif Nordling) expounded:
Slow release N. unlike what Scotts will deliver.....and my bag of corn gluten said 9%.
Actually looking at Scott's Turf builder... 30-3-3, an 18 pound bag feeds up to 5,000 square feet. For 10,000 sq ft that's 10.8 pounds of Nitrogen! Compared to just 4-5lbs for the corn. Corn is a moderate amount compared to commercial ferts.
1,000 square feet is 10ft x 100ft or 20ft x 50ft or 30ft x 33ftDiGiTAL ViNYL (no email) Zone 6b/7, Westchester Co, NY,
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