Plant Hormones

[BJRuttenberg]

I have recently been doing some light research on plant hormones. This research was tipped off by trying to figure out the purpose and content of ADA's Green Gain. From what I can determine, Green Gain is a solution of nutrients and a hormone called Cytokinin, which serves the purpose of of promoting cell division in plants. It is recommended that the green gain be added after trimming to prevent plants from experiencing shock. This seems to make sense but some people claim green gain is just high priced snake oil.

My questions: is there an appreciable effect of green gain on aquatic plants? Does anyone know what kind of cytokinin is used in green gain? Are there potentially other plant hormones that would benefit aquatic plant growth?

Thanks!
BJ

[Aquadream]

I have recently been doing some light research on plant hormones. This research was tipped off by trying to figure out the purpose and content of ADA's Green Gain. From what I can determine, Green Gain is a solution of nutrients and a hormone called Cytokinin, which serves the purpose of of promoting cell division in plants. It is recommended that the green gain be added after trimming to prevent plants from experiencing shock. This seems to make sense but some people claim green gain is just high priced snake oil.

My questions: is there an appreciable effect of green gain on aquatic plants? Does anyone know what kind of cytokinin is used in green gain? Are there potentially other plant hormones that would benefit aquatic plant growth?

Thanks!
BJ

I have been using Green Gain for a while in one of my tanks, not because I believe it is essential, but because I have it from a trade. In the other tanks I have not used it. I can not say if there is any effect or not. Only that in the tanks that are not treated with Green Gain plants are just as good.
In the tanks where I did not use ADA ferts I had much less issues with algae. May be I am not getting something about ADA stuff, but Easy Life for example works fantastic. I am not sure if they are not using plant hormones as well.

[Tom Barr]

None that I can tell.

There is scant real evidence that adding exogenous plant growth regulators(PGR's) will enhance AQUATIC PLANTS. Actually none I could fine to support this. ENDOGENOUSLY produced do cause such growth regulations.

This is very different than a one time temp fix or application to the water.

Folk's can and have used pgr's extensively for tissue culture and that also is very different.

You can also buy specific pgr's from supply companies. I've done this, never found much use for them when the simple basics of plant growth was addressed, plants when given good conditions do not need anything else, super thrive, various other things can be bought and tried, but no one has shown anything significant.

Put another way: if the plant lacks or is limited by bthe basic building blocks, trying to squeeze more out is not going to do much or get much vegetative growth in return.

Crypts flower more with application etc, that's the only study I've seen and repeated and confirmed it.'

Maybe you want larger grapes or fruit, but veg growth? not much is going to help, some folk's migth dip the tips of their stem plants into "rooting hormone" stuff they get at the nursery.

Much more trouble than is EVER needed to grow weedy stem plants however.

Search UF tissue cukture, mike kane etc.

I hack my 120 gal with reckless abandon...........there's no "shock".

I am doing my dissertation on plant growth reg's, but endogenous mostly on pondweed turion developmental control. Some exogenous application also, just be you never know and that's very easy test.........but they are often key to controlling weed propagules in the big picture.
No papers turned supporting the claims, I think 200 paper's worth would have something including several good papers from Japan........

[Tom Barr]

I have been using Green Gain for a while in one of my tanks, not because I believe it is essential, but because I have it from a trade. In the other tanks I have not used it. I can not say if there is any effect or not. Only that in the tanks that are not treated with Green Gain plants are just as good.
In the tanks where I did not use ADA ferts I had much less issues with algae. May be I am not getting something about ADA stuff, but Easy Life for example works fantastic. I am not sure if they are not using plant hormones as well.

If you believe works then a few people is all it takes to say it does
Folks have added pgr's for 30 years with the same results you got.

Go figure.

I can beat the snotout of issue at the academic level though, but why bother when we already have a long history of hobbyist who found no discernable difference using them?
Maybe ADA found some miracle all the researchers overlooked?

Not likely........
Maybe as likely as Penac being anything more than a scam for your money.

Does adding them harm anything other than the wallet? No, do they help? Not by any direct support, but many farmers and other sources seem to suggest they are key.........but the internal plant produced pgr's are VERY different than the chemicals dumped on them.
ADA fan boys are not the best most logical crowd to work with, nor as these the main message that ADA espouses. These products are minor items that ADA includes and have little to nothing to do with their overall product line, Amano even states as much.

Better to use the soil or similar, look at the scaping ideas, aesthetics and trim methods.....nice photography etc.

[BJRuttenberg]

But there is plenty of anecdotal evidence to suggest that exogenous application of PGRs enhance growth in terrestrial plants. Why should aquatic plants be any different provided these plants do not want for the essential building blocks? It just seems illogical to me that exogenous application would be so different between terrestrial and aquatic plants. Could it have something to do with the bio-availability of the hormone? Possibly the absence of a transport mechanism to allow for the hormone to pass through the plant cell walls?

And I speak of "shock" only in terms of the interval it takes for an aquatic plant to begin sending out new shoots and runners after trimming. From what I have read, this process is regulated by hormones. Shortly after the stem of a plant is trimmed, certain hormones are produced in greater abundance to signal the plant to begin further development. However there is a "signal delay" in hormone production from the time of cutting to the time of development. My though is that if such signaling hormone could be made available at time time of trimming it would expedite the re-development process.

None that I can tell.

There is scant real evidence that adding exogenous plant growth regulators(PGR's) will enhance AQUATIC PLANTS. Actually none I could fine to support this. ENDOGENOUSLY produced do cause such growth regulations.

This is very different than a one time temp fix or application to the water.

Folk's can and have used pgr's extensively for tissue culture and that also is very different.

You can also buy specific pgr's from supply companies. I've done this, never found much use for them when the simple basics of plant growth was addressed, plants when given good conditions do not need anything else, super thrive, various other things can be bought and tried, but no one has shown anything significant.

Put another way: if the plant lacks or is limited by bthe basic building blocks, trying to squeeze more out is not going to do much or get much vegetative growth in return.

Crypts flower more with application etc, that's the only study I've seen and repeated and confirmed it.'

Maybe you want larger grapes or fruit, but veg growth? not much is going to help, some folk's migth dip the tips of their stem plants into "rooting hormone" stuff they get at the nursery.

Much more trouble than is EVER needed to grow weedy stem plants however.

Search UF tissue cukture, mike kane etc.

I hack my 120 gal with reckless abandon...........there's no "shock".

I am doing my dissertation on plant growth reg's, but endogenous mostly on pondweed turion developmental control. Some exogenous application also, just be you never know and that's very easy test.........but they are often key to controlling weed propagules in the big picture.
No papers turned supporting the claims, I think 200 paper's worth would have something including several good papers from Japan........

[Aquadream]

If you believe works then a few people is all it takes to say it does
Folks have added pgr's for 30 years with the same results you got.

Go figure.

I can beat the snotout of issue at the academic level though, but why bother when we already have a long history of hobbyist who found no discernable difference using them?
Maybe ADA found some miracle all the researchers overlooked?

Not likely........
Maybe as likely as Penac being anything more than a scam for your money.

Does adding them harm anything other than the wallet? No, do they help? Not by any direct support, but many farmers and other sources seem to suggest they are key.........but the internal plant produced pgr's are VERY different than the chemicals dumped on them.
ADA fan boys are not the best most logical crowd to work with, nor as these the main message that ADA espouses. These products are minor items that ADA includes and have little to nothing to do with their overall product line, Amano even states as much.

Better to use the soil or similar, look at the scaping ideas, aesthetics and trim methods.....nice photography etc.

Well they (ADA) have some more similar magic drops that I do not think work either or at least I can not tell that they do.
I have been trying for the past two weeks a simple recipe for Nitrogen fertilizer that was suggested by a German guy on UKAPS. Now that one does work. I can see considerable difference between using his Nitrogen fertilizer soup and the one I used from ADA or just compared with simple KNO3.
About the ADA hormones all I can see is difference in the money I can spend.

[BJRuttenberg]

I have no doubt the fertilizers are quite useful in the growth if aquatic plants but my concern really rests with the potential ameliorative effect of certain growth hormones post trim.

I feel like if these hormones could be made available exogenously it would provide additional growth alternatives for hobbyists. For example we could induce certain plants to become more "bushy" or "leggy" depending on the hormone - just spitballing here.

[Tom Barr]

But there is plenty of anecdotal evidence to suggest that exogenous application of PGRs enhance growth in terrestrial plants. Why should aquatic plants be any different provided these plants do not want for the essential building blocks? It just seems illogical to me that exogenous application would be so different between terrestrial and aquatic plants. Could it have something to do with the bio-availability of the hormone? Possibly the absence of a transport mechanism to allow for the hormone to pass through the plant cell walls?

The plant organ in question, the propagules, flowers, fruits, etc.....rather than mere vegetative growth are why the plants have the hormones to begin with (in general).
Long distance organ development.

New leaves and roots with weedy herbaceous stem plants which all aquatics are.............are really not much concern.
Farmers do NOT add hormones on plants all the time...........they only add it at acritical time right before flowering/fruiting or to enhance the size of fruit /propagule production, not for vegetative growth.
In other words, the TYPE of growth is critical to the application and the targeted organ.
In aquariums, adding chemicals is very different, these are attacked by bacteria, diluted etc.

There are many folks over many decades now that have dumped pgr's on plants, and no one has found them useful, well, the ADA fanboy who believes everything ADA says perhaps............
Still, marketing can make the illogical seem logical, but that's why it's called marketing and not critical thinking and/or observation.

I'm not sure if you have seem my tanks, there's no delay in weedy growth, I cut and trim, they grow back right away.
Adding pgr's is not going to enhance this process or aid in the aquatic plant horticulture in any practical way. I would suggest you be very skeptical of that.
The other issue is that roots are growing 24/7 at a high rate anyway.........if they are hindered, it's not going to last much.

ADA general tops also, they rarely uproot, so the root angle is not a big issue with typical ADA trim methods and resprouting.
If you feel the need for fast recovery and growth, add more light/CO2/ferts..........

Many want reduced growth rates however.

I think folks get side tracked on these issues that mean VERY little in terms of horticulture and this distracts a great deal from the things that do matter: good trimming, ferts/light/CO2/care/water changes, cleaning filter, feeding fish etc.
This is not something that would help ANYONE tip the scales and lead them to plant nirvana.

I've added 6 different pgr's to plants, Crypts emergent growth was about all I could say had any significant effect. I used them for some time.
To have the best impact on root regrowth, you can dip them in root hormone products available on line or from most nurseries. This adds the highest concentration.
If you think it helps, knock your self out. It would take a great deal of convincing results before I buy it's even remotely useful for growing the weeds we keep.

And I speak of "shock" only in terms of the interval it takes for an aquatic plant to begin sending out new shoots and runners after trimming. From what I have read, this process is regulated by hormones. Shortly after the stem of a plant is trimmed, certain hormones are produced in greater abundance to signal the plant to begin further development. However there is a "signal delay" in hormone production from the time of cutting to the time of development. My though is that if such signaling hormone could be made available at time time of trimming it would expedite the re-development process.

This is where the difference between internally regulated pgr's vs external ones makes all the difference in the world.
Plants will develop new organs all by themselves, this is what plants do, they make chemicals.
No need to add them, this is not going to aid in redevelopment for such weedy species.
If you want a larger pumpkin, "gibbing" the grapes, larger flowers, more flowers etc......sure.

But the timing difference is not going to amplify this much, there's just no evidence to support this in aquatic weeds.
Even if it did, why not wait a day or two instead of being is such a hurry? The relative growth rate is still going to be defined by the basic building blocks: N, C, P, etc........

You are not going to get something for nuthing.
If recovery is slow.........I'd look elsewhere than pgr's........

I think the point is made and has been made many times over the decades where folks have added pgr's.....they had no discernable effect/impact anyone could observe or measure in any way for aquatic plants. Like the whole allelopathy business and heater cable muckery.
We use pgr inhibitors all the time in weed science to stop endogenous production to stop new organ development, but this is very different.

[Tom Barr]

Well they (ADA) have some more similar magic drops that I do not think work either or at least I can not tell that they do.
I have been trying for the past two weeks a simple recipe for Nitrogen fertilizer that was suggested by a German guy on UKAPS. Now that one does work. I can see considerable difference between using his Nitrogen fertilizer soup and the one I used from ADA or just compared with simple KNO3.
About the ADA hormones all I can see is difference in the money I can spend.

There's a good reason why some see added benefits with the N, NH4 is an issue if you lack a significant fish load, feed fish well etc, which I pointed out and noted in each successful case.

You can add NH4 via fish waste/food or inorganic forms. I like fish more than inorganic NH4 personally.

[BJRuttenberg]

Tom, thank you for the explanation and addressing my concerns. Very helpful!

Cheers,
BJ