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Crazy Roots · Hydroponics Daily

• 0:00
  Hi, welcome back to Hydroponics Daily with me, Dr. Russell Sharp.
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  Today we're talking about crazy roots.
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  Sounds like a product you might find in a grow shop, doesn't it?
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  Check out this amazing crazy roots, wacky product, maybe a mycorrhizal product.
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  Unfortunately, it's not a wacky product. It's a serious disease found in many
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  commercial greenhouses.
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  And crazy roots, as the name suggests,
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  makes the plant roots go crazy and produce lots of unwanted roots.
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  So you get too many roots and they're not the right type of roots that you want.
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  And it's a bacterial disease. And it was first discovered in 1985 in the UK
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  and in mainland Europe as well.
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  And since then, it's spread to many commercial greenhouses,
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  especially on continental europe where it came from this is some debate i did
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  once read that it was an introduced biostimulant bacterial biostimulant that got out of hand however.
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  That seems to be erased from the record
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  books or i just made that up and it doesn't and that
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  wasn't actually the truth but i'm sure someone told me that or i read
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  it somewhere can't find reference to it when it came to research
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  this topic for today so people say
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  don't concentrate where it came from concentrate on how to control it
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  and the key thing is it's a bacterial disease
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  and so many of the fungicides used
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  to control disease won't affect it and it's
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  more about control and making sure it doesn't get into your greenhouse and that
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  and that's about making sure that you've got good phytosanitary
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  practices in place making sure that you've like in
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  most commercial greenhouses you have to wash your
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  feet or your feet what am i not about you
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  have to go to wash your shoes so make sure that you'll change your shoes or
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  put coverings on your shoes you have to wash your hands you're not able to take
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  bags in watches things like that when you go to the toilet you have to wash
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  your hands before and after to prevent contamination on hand on handles and
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  things like this and locks in the toilets,
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  and other forms of control making sure you don't shake hands with fellow growers
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  you know sort of covid you know maybe you could elbow each other or something
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  like that you know whatever those those covid era practices were so it's a bacteria
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  called rhizobium rhizogenes it used to be called.
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  Agrobacterium rhizogenes and that's the same
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  genus that you find crown gall in brassicas
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  and it's a bacteria that's again very
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  difficult to control in in in brassica crops
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  cabbages and things like that and it's the same bacteria that's used in
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  genetic engineering because it's has this amazing ability
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  to insert its own genes into
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  plants and those genes can remain even after the
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  bacteria have been killed off so it's a
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  very interesting one bacteria and it's
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  on the rise around the world and crazy roots
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  and the roots fill up and it's mainly a problem
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  for growers who are growing in rock wool or mineral wool and can
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  block up the outlets and basically
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  just leads to yield losses
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  because plants are producing too many roots so the
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  roots that are produced are not geotropic so
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  they don't grow down like most roots do and
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  they're hairy roots and what's interesting
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  is that it's thought that the the bacteria get
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  into the plant as a sort of secondary infection after they've
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  been wounded as well so preventing damage to
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  transplanted young plants would be also crucial so
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  it's mainly a disease that you need to focus on
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  if you're growing in nft because of the rock wall situation
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  and it's as i
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  say not controlled by fungicides because it's.
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  A bacteria you would need to use very strong antibiotics and
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  that wouldn't be allowed in most countries i think
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  and and so it's really about disinfecting your
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  grow grow environment and then praying that
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  it doesn't come in on infected plant material can be
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  transferred by seeds as well but it's probably going to come on come in on plants
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  and infected soil as well so i think it causes a lot of damage in eastern europe
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  as well so especially poland and places like this and it's one to look out for
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  If you see too many roots on your plants, maybe you've got crazy roots.
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  I've never come across it personally because basically I don't grow in rockwool very often. And...
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  Probably more of a more of
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  an issue for very large glass houses people who
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  grow in cocoa and especially comp peat-based
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  growing medias so the ones that
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  you get that claim to be soil-based grow bags often a lot of peat the bacteria
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  tends not to thrive in or in organic matter it's more the inert media so if
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  you've come across crazy roots if you've got any ways of solving it that doesn't
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  involve disinfectants and things like this, then let me know.
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  It's one to look out for. Crazy Reads.