ASHS 2025 Conference

Transplants provide an early start and help with better establishment and enhanced yield and quality in vegetable crops. For production of healthy and high-quality transplants, nutrient management is critical. There are several organic amendments available that can be directly added to the transplant growing media to provide essential nutrients for transplant growth and development. Some of the commonly used amendments include blood meal, bone meal, feather meal, fish emulsion, alfalfa meal, crab meal, shrimp meal, bat guano, etc., These organic amendments are obtained from dried animal blood or bone products which are rich in nutrients like Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium. Even though these amendments are available, there is lack of information on their efficacy and impact in organic transplant production. This greenhouse study conducted at Iowa State University, investigated the use of several amendments in broccoli transplant production. Treatments included: blood meal, bone meal, feather meal, fish emulsion, compost, conventional fertilizer, compost, and a no-fertilizer control. Plant height, stem diameter, SPAD (Soil Plant Analysis Development), dry biomass, and root length are the parameters we analyzed to determine the transplant growth. The findings show that the conventional fertilizer treatment had the tallest plant, with a mean height of 8.54 cm, followed by the blood meal with a height of 8.15 cm. No significant difference was observed between the conventional fertilizer and blood meal treatment. The highest mean stem diameter was found in the blood meal treatment, measuring 4.2 mm, followed by the feather meal treatment, which had a mean stem diameter of 3.65 mm. Blood meal and feather meal treatments were significantly different from each other. The plant biomass was high in the blood meal treatment at 3.36g. The blood and feather meal treatments differed significantly from the bone meal, compost, fish emulsion, and control treatments. Results from this study show that organic amendments can be successfully used to improve the transplant growth with a single application, potentially saving labor and cost. Keywords: transplants, organic amendments, SPAD, nutrients, blood meal, bone meal, feather meal.