Sugarcane Bagasse Ash as a Seedling Growth Media Component

Abstract

Bagasse is the fibrous material remaining after removing the sucrose, water, and other impurities (filter mud) from the milable sugarcane. Louisiana sugarcane mills use a portion of the sugarcane bagasse for fuel producing over 20,411 mt of sugarcane bagasse ash (SBA) as a by-product. The purpose of this research was to investigate the use of SBA as an amendment to soilless planting media for the production of vegetable seedlings. The SBA was combined by volume with a commercial soilless growing media into 5 combinations (0%:100%, 25%:75%, 50%:50%, 75%:25%, and 100%:0%, SBA and growing media, respectively). Squash var. 'Straightneck' and cantaloupe var. 'Magnum Hybrid Melon' were planted in each of the 5 different planting mixtures. The research indicates that the addition of SBA can enhance squash and cantaloupe seedling growth depending on the percentage of the ash added to the growth media. Squash plant stalk lengths and total plant fresh weights (stalk, leaves, tops, roots, and total plant) overall responded best at the 75% SBA. Squash dry weights were consistently greater when SBA was added to the soilless media compared to no SBA. The 25% and 50% SBA media produced the greatest cantaloupe leaf fresh weights. Cantaloupe leaf dry weights followed a similar trend, where the 25% and 50% SBA media produced greater plant weights with lesser yields observed at the 75% and 100% SBA levels. This data suggests that the 75% SBA and 25% SBA were certainly suitable potting media combinations for squash and cantaloupe seedling production, respectively.

Impact of Sugarcane Bagasse Ash as an Amendment on the Physical Properties, Nutrient Content and Seedling Growth of a Certified Organic Greenhouse Growing Media

“…The addition of these extractable essential minor elements through the addition of the SBA has the potential to increase the nutrient status of the growing media. These results may explain earlier research by Webber et al (2016) where 25% and 75% SBA increased cantaloupe and squash seedling growth, respectively. y Means in a column followed by the same lower case letter are not significantly different at P ≤ 0.05, ANOVA.…”

“…One of the most common practices is the field application of SBA alone or in combination with the sugarcane mill's filter mud (Barry et al, 1998;Prasad, 1974;Sales & Lima, 2010). Webber et al (2016) determined that adding 25 and 75% SBA to a certified organic growth media produced suitable potting media for cantaloupe and squash seedling production, respectively. The purpose of this research was to investigate the use of SBA as an amendment to soilless planting media for the production of additional vegetable seedlings.…”

Sugarcane Biochar as an Amendment for Greenhouse Growing Media for the Production of Cucurbit Seedlings

“…Investigating the use of sugarcane bagasse ash as an amendment to soilless greenhouse growing media, it was determined that the amended media functioned well in many respects for the seedling production for squash, cantaloupe, bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.), and Chinese kale (Brassica alboglabra). Unfortunatly, as the percentage of bagasse ash increased from 0 to 100% ash, the bulk densities also increased (0.12 to 71 g cm -3 ), resulting in decrease in the physical growing media (Webber et al, 2016(Webber et al, , 2017b.…”

“…In contrast to sugarcane bagasse ash, adding biochar to a soilless growing media should provide a more ideal physical environment (Laird, 2008;Webber et al, 2016;2017b). Although, in general, biochars have many characteristics in common, the plant material source and the preparation methods employed can greatly influence the properties and effectiveness when used as an amendment in soilless growing media (Vaughn et al, 2013).…”

“…In a research review of environmentally sustainable amendments for soilless growing media, 27 different organic materials were listed, including 4 amendments related to sugarcane waste (Barrett et al, 2016). The sugarcane waste materials included as amendments for soilless growing media were filtercake compost (Stoffella et al, 1996), sugarcane trash/sewage sludge compost (Jayasinghe et al, 2010), sugarcane bagasse ash (Webber et al, 2016), and sugarcane bagasse/manure vermicompost (Khomami & Moharam, 2013). The three primary criteria for selecting amendments used in soilless growing media are performance, economics, and the increasing emphasis on the environmental impact (Barrett et al, 2016).…”