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Previously we have discussed the effects of Agnihotra and Agnihotra Ash on the growth and disease resistance of plants – both under lab conditions and in a greenhouse. But what are the effects in field conditions? |
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The first systematic study on Homa Organic Farming was done in the CSK Agricultural University in Palampur (photo left), Himachal Pradesh (a Northern State in India, at the edge of the Himalaya mountains). |
| Interesting how this research project started. In 2006, Karin Heschl and Bruce Johnson, both experts on Homa Organic Farming who live in India, gave presentations at a conference on organic farming in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu. After Karin’s presentation in which she mentioned considerable increase in the yield of mangoes in Homa Therapy atmosphere, one participant of the conference, Dr. DS Rathore, at that time Vice-Chancellor of the CSK Palampur Agricultural University, expressed his protest afterwards– saying that it is just impossible that burning cow dung and ghee and uttering some simple mantras could bring about such effects. Another senior agricultural scientist, Dr. RK Pathak, saw this and talked to Dr. Rathore – saying that it is unscientific to just claim the Homa method cannot work. A scientific approach would be to set up an experiment and show that the method does not work. Dr. Rathore agreed, so they were setting up a small Homa Organic Farm on the land of the university. In 2007, Reiner Sczypior, a Homa volunteer from Austria who then stayed in India, set up the resonance system. On that farm during several years a lot of research was conducted. Soon it became clear that the original aim – showing that Homa methods do not work – could not be achieved. On the contrary, they got many good results. They studied the effect of organic nutrients including Agnihotra Ash on crop productivity and soil health. Medicinal plants like lemongrass, wild marigold, and aloe vera were chosen. With lemongrass, there was a significant increase in the yield attributes viz plant height, number of leaves and plant spread and ultimately the yield of lemongrass increased with the addition of organics over the control. Highest biological yield (7833 kg per hectare) was obtained in the treatment with organic manure + Agnihotra Ash + sowing according to the moon calendar, while lowest yield (2833 kg per hectare) was obtained in control + not following the moon calendar. Second best treatments was that using organic manure + Agnihotra Ash, but not following the moon calendar. Also the oil content was best in treatments with Agnihotra Ash – up to seven times higher than control! Similar results were with wild marigold and with aloe vera. The authors sum up their findings as follows: "To sum up, it has been clearly demonstrated in this experiment that in lemon grass, wild marigold and aloe vera Agnihotra Ash was significantly superior to other organic treatments." |
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The second part of their research was about soil health, a very important factor also for future production (and declining soil health is a big problem worldwide because of conventional farming). |
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