MaxSil’s outstanding results on extreme salt affected land

In a trial crop of barley this month (September) Claire Stevens from Steven’s Farm at Kellerberrin north-northeast of Perth is looking at the best ever crop of barley ever produced that she says her father can ever remember in a saline-affected paddock.

The MaxSil silicon fertiliser-coated Maximus barley crop was dry sown on May 17 in what has been a dry year. By July 6, the plants were at a four-leaf tillering stage. In the video, Claire shows off the MaxSil treated barley, which she explains has a lot less disease, more healthy roots that are purpling, showing that the plant has absorbed some toxins from the soil.

By contrast, a non-treated Maximus plant root structure was a lot smaller, she said. “The roots have suffered, intolerance, and it's got a lot more disease in it.”

“Before sowing when the crop germinated, the seed that was coated had a higher survival, rate and a lot bigger and better root growth over this salt scald, which has been very problematic at 20,000 parts per million”, Claire said.

“It's extreme and we did this as a test to see the limiting factor of the products,” Claire said that in the untreated control area, the Maximus barley germinated only half as much and the plants suffered a lot more.

“They don't have half the root growth, nor do they have the disease resistance. When we pulled the plants up and looked at them on July 6, you could see seeds that had shot with one nodule or one stem coming up and they had died.” Claire said from previous results in 2020 where MaxSil was trialed the difference could still be seen in the paddock compared to the other untreated paddock that was still salt scalded.