In this article:

Insects In Your Garden
When you are gardening outdoors, insects are a fact of life. They belong outside, and you’re probably glad they are out there instead of in your house. There are some insects that can be beneficial to plant growth, by pollinating flowers and eating pests. There are other insects that will eat your plants and even introduce diseases to them. Some insects affect gardens all over, while other pests are limited by region. However, there are some measures you can take to reduce their impact on your plants. Introducing predator insects can decrease the populations of many pests, and these can be purchased at most garden stores. Creating barriers around your garden or crops can also help reduce the damage done by certain insects.

The Most Devastating Plant Pests
Aphids (Aphidoidea)
Aphids are some of the most common garden pests. They’re recognizable as tiny, pear-shaped bodies and many of them are green, though they can also be black, red, brown, or yellow. With more than 4,000 species in existence, there’s a lot of variety to be found. In small numbers, they are not harmful to plants, but they often infest gardens in large numbers. They stunt plants and can cause them to wither. They also leave behind a fluid called honeydew as they eat. It’s sweet, and it attracts ants and causes mold growth. Pruning the affected areas can be helpful for dealing with small infestations. Otherwise, introducing aphid predators, such as ladybugs and lacewings, can be helpful. Ladybugs and lacewings are both sold in bulk to help lower aphid populations. They also eat other garden pests.

Grasshoppers (Caelifera)
Grasshoppers are damaging not because of their numbers, but because of how much they need to eat. Experts estimate that every year, they eat about 25 percent of crops grown in the Western United States. Because of this, even a small population can cause sizable damage. They are typically one or two inches long, and range in color from brown to yellow to green. One suggested tip is to keep a mown strip between your garden and any grassy areas. A strip mown clean deters them from crossing the strip to get to your plants. This is especially effective in large areas with a wide strip. Pesticides or a special fungus targeted at these pests can also be effective in decreasing their populations.

Snails and Slugs (Gastropods)
Though these don’t qualify as insects, they are some of the most insidious garden pests in the United States. They do especially well in damp areas, especially in hidden spots found under rocks and other garden features. They will chew holes into plants of all kinds, ranging from vegetables to flowers to leafy greens. Snails and slugs thrive in heavy mulch, so avoid laying down more than three inches at a time. Removing decorative stones and bricks takes away their hiding spots if you are willing to sacrifice their aesthetic value. Otherwise, traps are an excellent way to collect and kill these pests. Basins filled with beer attract these creatures, and once inside, they will drown. Diatomaceous earth and copper tape can create barriers to prevent slugs and snails from getting to their favorite plants to eat.

Common Plant Pests
In addition to aphids, grasshoppers, snails and slugs, here are the most common plant pets:

1. Whiteflies (Aleyrodidae): Small, flying insects that suck plant juices, leading to yellowing, wilting, and reduced vigor.
2. Spider Mites (Tetranychidae): These tiny arachnids feed on plant fluids, causing stippling, discoloration, and webbing on leaves.
3. Caterpillars (Lepidoptera larvae): Various caterpillar species can chew on leaves, flowers, and fruits, causing extensive damage.
4. Leafhoppers (Cicadellidae): They pierce plant tissue and feed on sap, causing yellowing and wilting, and in severe cases, transmitting diseases.
5. Thrips (Thysanoptera): These small, slender insects scrape plant tissue, causing silvery, scarred, or distorted leaves.
6. Cutworms (Noctuidae larvae): They are nocturnal larvae that cut through stems at soil level, causing young plants to wilt and die.
7. Japanese Beetles (Popillia japonica): These insects skeletonize leaves and can cause extensive damage in large numbers.
8. Scale Insects (Coccoidea): These immobile pests attach themselves to plant surfaces and feed on sap, causing weakened growth and leaf yellowing.

Soil Supplements that Help with Pests

• Diatomaceous earth is a naturally occurring, soft, siliceous sedimentary rock that can be crumbled into a fine white to off-white powder and tilled into the soil and/or top-dressed.
• Recycled glass material found at hydro stores which is top dressed on the soil and is an excellent way to control bugs that reproduce in the soil like fungus gnats.
• Harvest Gold Organics is a premium soil conditioner made from recycled gold mine tailings. The mineral content, silica, and the way the particles are structured contribute to preventing bugs from reproducing in the soil and helps the plants grow stronger, which makes them more resistant to bugs. 

Weeds in Your Garden
Most gardeners work with a specific idea in mind on how they want to organize the yard. You might want lots of vegetable plants or lots of butterfly-attracting flowers, or maybe you’re gardening with color in mind. Weeds can disrupt all of this. They will grow in places where you want another plant to thrive, and many of them are good at taking over the resources, such as space and nutrients, that are meant to go to the original garden plants. They produce seeds, sometimes up to thousands per plant. Below are some of the most common weeds to watch out for, and how to reduce their presence in your garden.

The Most Devastating Weeds
The most common weeds will vary slightly from region to region, but some are found all across North America. Dandelions (Taraxacum officinale) are one such plant. Because they have a long tap root, they are tough to kill, and their seeds are aerodynamic enough to spread easily. Bindweed (Convolvulus arvensis), a type of morning glory vine, is an invasive species that can be hard to get rid of since it has roots that extend up to 14 feet down and it spreads widely in warm climates, strangling your plants. Lamb’s Quarters (Chenopodium album) is the most common garden weed, which can grow rapidly and compete with crops. It grows quickly and soaks up moisture before other plants can get to it. It is best addressed with a sharp hoe or another tool.

With plants like these, it’s best to recognize seedlings before they have a chance to fully take root. On the bright side, dandelion and lamb’s quarters are edible and make wonderful medicinal teas for a wide range of ailments.

Common Weed Types
In addition to dandelion, bindweed, and lamb’s quarters, here are the most common weeds:

1. Crabgrass (Digitaria spp.): An annual grass weed that quickly spreads and outcompetes desirable plants for resources.
2. Broadleaf Dock (Rumex obtusifolius): A perennial broadleaf weed with deep roots that can interfere with crop growth.
3. Common Purslane (Portulaca oleracea): This succulent annual weed can be highly competitive and hard to control.
4. Chickweed (Stellaria media): A low-growing annual weed that can smother plants and compete for nutrients.
5. Ground Ivy (Glechoma hederacea): A creeping perennial weed that can cover large areas and suppress plant growth.
6. Creeping Charlie (Glechoma hederacea): A perennial weed that spreads rapidly and can crowd out other plants.
7. Mullein (Verbascum spp.): A biennial weed that can produce a large rosette of leaves, shading out other plants.

Why Do Weeds Grow?
Weeds are resilient plants, and they grow all over the place. Even in the most desolate cracked concrete, you will often find some weeds poking up. This isn’t a coincidence — when the conditions are too harsh for other plants to grow, weeds crop up. When healthy plants are present, weeds are less likely to grow. Keeping your garden well-fertilized and in top form will reduce weed growth. Prevention is the best method for reducing weed growth. Once these plants successfully grow in your garden, it can be extremely difficult to remove them altogether.

Be Aware of Weed Seeds
It’s safe to assume that your garden is filled with weed seeds once one weed has flowered. Many of them remain viable for several years. However, only the top few inches of soil are close enough to the surface, and sunlight, for them to actually begin to grow. Remember this as you do routine garden work, and avoid needless digging or churning the soil. When you bring them to the surface, they will grow. You can avoid disturbing the soil while rooting out weeds by using a knife to slice through their roots, rather than digging into the ground to get them out.

Growing Methods that Keep Weeds Out
Biodiversity refers to the range of life that grows on all levels from bugs and animals to plants and people. When your garden is biodiverse, it attracts a range of bugs that work with all living species. By attracting bugs, you are attracting defenders that control the pests that are harmful to your garden.
Regenerative agriculture is when farmers rotate different types of crops over time. This helps limit pest infestations and nourishes beneficial microbes in the soil with a more diverse diet. Rotating between nitrogen-fixing crops like soybeans and nitrogen-hungry crops like corn can reduce the need for fertilizers.

Plant Strategically
Weeds arise wherever they see an opening, so avoid giving them one. When you design your garden, create plant beds that are tightly packed with biodiversity in mind. Spaces between plants leave an opening for weeds, so plant foliage close together. It’s usually harmless to plant them up to 25 percent closer than the recommended spacing, so take advantage and crowd weeds out.

A Soil Conditioner that Helps with Pests and Weeds
Harvest Gold Organics Soil Conditioner enriches your soil and creates a solid foundation for your plants to grow and thrive. The silica makes plants resilient and helps them absorb more water and nutrients while increasing the thickness of the plant’s structures. Other minerals such as iron, magnesium, and phosphate also promote plant health, aiding vital processes from chlorophyll production to photosynthesis, making your plants resistant to pests while giving your plants a fighting chance against weeds. Invest in your garden with this helpful product.

In Summary
It’s important to identify and manage pests and weeds promptly to minimize their impact on plant health. Knowing the culprits and taking quick action is one of the keys to minimizing their effect. Integrated pest management (IPM) practices, which include a combination of cultural, biological, and chemical control methods, can be effective in preventing and managing these issues. Additionally, promoting healthy plant growth through proper nutrition and care, such as adding Harvest Gold Organics Premium Soil Conditioner, can also help plants withstand pest and weed pressures.

In this article:

Silica has been used for centuries in many different ways and forms. Some of the more common uses are in technology, construction, and agriculture. It is prevalent both in nature and man-made products.

What Is Silica?

How Is Silica Used?

Silica has become an incredibly useful material across many different industries, from technology to construction and even agriculture. By changing its shape to suit different purposes, it can be combined with other materials to give them new properties.

You’d be surprised by what silica is used in. It’s almost everywhere:

● Silica is used in multiple industries from construction to chemicals to glass and in common products such as paint, plastic, and rubber.

● Silica is a trace mineral integral to the structure and functional integrity of connective tissue, and it is a common health supplement that aids in the development of strong bones, skin, and nails.

● Silica absorbs moisture in everything from food packets to shoe boxes and dirty laundry to toolboxes.

What Is the Role of Silica in Plant Growth?

Plants can be categorized into three types in terms of their relation to silica. 

Plants are classified into accumulators, excluders, and intermediate types, (Mitani and Ma, 2005) depending on the amount of biogenic silica found in their tissues.

Among the accumulators are Equisetales, Cyperales, and Poales. In Gramineae, rice is the highest silicifier: Si (in the form of biogenic silica, see below) accounts for up to 10% of the shoot dry weight (Ma et al., 2002).

Tomato is among the excluders. While the most significant benefits have been tied to accumulator plants, even non-accumulator plants like tomatoes have demonstrated positive responses to silica’s use in fertilization and growth medias. The most obvious benefits have been stronger stalks and pest and mold resistance, resulting in bigger plants and more fruit.

Urtica dioica (i.e., nettle) is an intermediate type (Trembath-Reichert et al., 2015) and has also demonstrated positive results with silica supplementation, but it is wise to take caution with supplementation. These plants are vulnerable to over-fertilization. 

Many peer-reviewed, scientific studies have been done in recent years to determine the effects of silica on plant growth. Although silica is not one of the essential elements required for plant development, silica is categorized as a beneficial nutrient within the scientific community. These studies found several critical benefits from its inclusion.

Some of the benefits realized include:

● Increased resistance to abiotic stress, and external stressors like drought, wind, and heat.
● Increased resistance to biotic stress, and external living stressors like animals, bacteria, and fungi.
● The promising role of silica nanoparticles in plants

Silica Improves the Resistance to Abiotic Stress for Plants

Silica produces a complex reaction in the physiology of plants that creates a dynamic interplay between plant metabolism and cell wall structure.

In perfect conditions, the silica’s effect may be latent. However, with the introduction of an abiotic stressor such as drought, heat, or salt, the results are positive. Stronger stems help keep plants sturdy in wind and rain. Longer roots help to extract water from the soil while the epidermis of the leaves helps to retain some of the water loss that occurs during transpiration.

Silica seems to promote an alkalizing effect in metal-heavy soil, thereby decreasing the concentration in the soil.

This is partially because of the release of antioxidant enzymes that assuage oxidative stress. Leaves of plants with silica exposure also contain higher amounts of chlorophyll.

Bioavailable silica helps to reinforce the structural integrity of plant stems, roots, and leaves by strengthening the cell walls.

Silica Improves the Resistance to Biotic Stress in Plants

Silica creates a protective measure against animals, bacteria, and fungi in a couple of ways. One is that the composition of the plant itself becomes less palatable.

A second is that the molecular structure becomes less digestible. A third protective measure is the ability to ward off predators.

The Role of Nanoparticles in Plants

Sustainable agricultural models and food scarcity have long-standing importance, and silica nanoparticles may play an important role in solving these issues. Through a controlled release into the soil, silica nanoparticles and their counterparts combine to yield healthier, stronger, bigger plants.

In certain plants, this can affect germination, root growth, and chlorophyll levels. More research needs to be done in this area, but the current findings are promising.

Which Plants Benefit the Most from Silica Supplementation?

Recently industries such as cotton, sugar cane, and sod are recognizing the potential benefits of silica. 

Recent research coming out of Australia demonstrates that crops such as rice, barley, oats, cotton, wheat, rye, sunflower, corn, sugar cane, potatoes, and forage crops all benefit from high levels of silicic acid in their cell tissues.

How Does Silica Benefit Plants?

1. Improved Structural Integrity: Silica is taken up by plants and deposited in their cell walls, enhancing their structural integrity. This results in stronger, more robust plants that are able to withstand environmental stresses such as wind, rain, and pest pressure.
2. Increased Disease Resistance: Silica helps plants defend against pathogens and pests. When deposited in the cell walls, it forms a physical barrier that makes it harder for fungi and insects to penetrate and infect plant tissues.
3. Enhanced Drought Tolerance: Plants with sufficient silica levels are better equipped to handle drought conditions. The strengthened cell walls help retain water and reduce water loss through transpiration.
4. Improved Nutrient Uptake: Silica facilitates the absorption of other essential nutrients, such as calcium and phosphorus. This can lead to overall healthier and more productive plants.
5. Alleviation of Metal Toxicity: Silica can help plants tolerate higher levels of certain metals, such as aluminum and manganese, which can be toxic to plants in excess.
6. Enhanced Photosynthesis: Silica aids in the process of photosynthesis by improving the structure of chloroplasts. This can lead to increased photosynthetic efficiency and ultimately higher yields.
7. Resistance to Environmental Stresses: Silica-enriched plants are better able to withstand environmental stresses such as high salt content, extreme temperatures, and soils high in heavy metal contamination.
8. Improved Crop Quality: Silica has been linked to better quality crops, including increased fruit and grain size, higher sugar content, higher terpenes, and improved resistance to lodging (the bending or breaking of plant stems).
9. Longer Storage Life: Silica can help extend the post-harvest storage life of certain crops by reducing decay and deterioration.

Improved Nutritional Content: Some studies suggest that plants grown with sufficient silica levels may have higher levels of certain nutrients, which can translate to better nutritional content for humans and animals that consume these plants.

Can Silica Be Dangerous?

Silica can be harmful when turned into a very fine crystalline dust and inhaled.

Silica is generally harmless in its most common form and is even used as a health supplement and sold in pill form to strengthen brittle bones, teeth, nails, and hair. 

Silica can be harmful when turned into a very fine crystalline dust and inhaled.

This may present a risk for people working in specific types of construction or manufacturing, but not gardening or farm management. In use as a silica fertilizer or growth medium, there is no danger from exposure or relating to its application. Products containing silica are to be treated as most other fertilizers and feeders.

How to Apply Silica to Improve Plant Growth

Silica is naturally occurring and therefore typically excellent for organic gardening; however, there are silicon supplements that are created in a lab. These lab-made supplements are chemically derived by combining Si (silica) with O2 (oxygen), creating SiO2, silicon dioxide, so if you’re keen to grow organically, you would want to consider a bioavailable silica made by nature.

It is worth noting that while silica is abundant in most soils, it may not always be in a plant-available form. There are two types of naturally occurring silica that are bioavailable to plants:

1. There is amorphous silica derived from lava rock. 
2. There is bioavailable silica that comes from old mining sites. 

Bioavailable silicon dioxide is especially powerful because it naturally encompasses veins of precious stones and metals like gold providing a broad range of minerals . Old mining sites have these tailings (mine waste) sitting on top of the ground, being washed by the rain, making the silica and other naturally occurring elements bioavailable with time. 

Always remember, the specific benefits of silica can vary depending on the plant species, the growing conditions, and the presence of other nutrients.

Silica for Hydroponic Growing

Hydroponic growing is growing plants in water with no soil. Growers add plant essential nutrients through the water system and feed their plants with precision due to this method. The drawback is that nutrients get wasted with this method because the plant takes up nutrients at different times in its maturity, so it is key for the grower to know when beneficial nutrients are needed to support the plants in maturation. 

Adding a solution-type silica would benefit hydroponic growing because there is no soil medium which aids in the growth of most plants.

Silica for Soil-Based Growing

The best way to introduce silica to your plants and crops is through a nutrient solution that will be delivered throughout the entire lifecycle of the plant. From seedling to final yield, plants need and will benefit from silica. By adding silica to soil-based crops, silica is always present to the plant at its root system. 

It is common to increase the amount of nutrient solution as the plant matures, but be sure to read the product instructions and follow them accordingly.

How to Add Silica to Soil for Plant Growth

Harvest Gold Organics Premium Soil Conditioner is a unique silica aggregate that contains naturally occurring beneficial plant nutrients. The multifaceted soil amendment incorporates natural SiO2 (silicon dioxide) and eight plant essential elements, which, when watered, become bioavailable to surrounding plants.

This delivery method of silica and nutrients is unique in not only the initial delivery, but also its release over time, which amplifies plant growth throughout the entire season by providing a consistent release of micronutrients. When combined with a fertilizer, the angular shape of Harvest Gold Organics also helps to manage uptake and release of water and nutrients. Harvest Gold Organics allows you to reduce water and fertilizer by approximately 30%.

Harvest Gold Organics Premium Soil Conditioner is enriched with not only silica but also calcium, iron, sulfur, magnesium, and other micronutrients. It targets and maintains the nutrients vital to plant health in the area needed most: the roots. This results in bigger yields and less work. Perfect for organic gardening with flowers, vegetables, trees, and shrubs, Harvest Gold is USDA certified, certified for organic gardening by OMRI, and guarantees a high spectrum of nutrients. One application works all year round.

In Summary

Silica really is an amazing element that helps increase resistance to abiotic and biotic stress, resulting in stronger plants and plentiful harvests. Harvest Gold Organics Premium Soil Conditioner contains natural silica and eight plant essential elements necessary to grow big, strong plants, and tasty edibles without using harsh chemical fertilizers that cause damage to the environment and people.

Whether working on an indoor or outdoor project, using a non-toxic, chemical-free solution that feeds continuously without damaging the soil is beneficial to you and your plants. 

You can buy Harvest Gold Organics Premium Soil Conditioner on our website, Amazon, Home Depot, Lowe’s, and many other retailers. If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to reach out. We would love to hear from you!