Friday, January 7, 2011

A crash course in Radionics


Both Catherine and Charlie suggested I tried to visit Kym Green – a cherry and apple grower in the hills near Adelaide. It’s mid cherry harvest at the moment so I was very grateful when Kym agreed to meet me. Kym uses a mixture of compost, conventional chemicals and biodynamic preparations in conjunction with radionics to produce beautiful cherries that are the best I’ve ever tasted. Radionics is the practice of using a machine to ask the plant what nutrients it is short of and what product or mix of products would satisfy that need best.

Kym sits on many of the industries boards and regularly speaks at conferences in America. He has won many awards for his innovations – including using bird nets over the cherries. All the cherries are picked and graded by hand – they use very cold water to help bring the temperature of the cherries down (from around 40 C) to preserve the colour, flavour and texture of the fruit.

Kym uses grasses as green manures ‘in crop’ and green manure mixtures between re planting. This has all helped Kym raise his soil organic matter from 1.5 to 6%. The orchards are perched on steep hills, all the grass is mowed between rows – a job I wouldn’t queue up for on those slopes! Kyms methods are producing very healthy trees and juicy fruit.

A quick spree in the R M Williams shop in Adelaide today confirms the daily liveweight gain theory!

1 comment:

  1. I find your blog fascinating and realized it does not show that I am following! Drat that blogger!
    Prayer please for Nick and team mates as they run in the Colorado state cross country championship today at 1 P.M. MST. I do follow your parable blog. I must hurry over there too.
    Hugs today for you and yours
    Anne

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