6. LIQUID MANNURES & PESTICIDES Panchagavya is a combination of 5 products obtained from the cow which is used in traditional medicine extensively. These are cow dung, cow’s urine, cow’s milk, curd and ghee. This is also mentioned in Vrkshayurveda texts and it has been experimented by various organic farmers. It has a significant role in providing resistance to pests and disease and increasing the overall yield. a. Panchagavya as a Liquid Mannure: Ingredients: • Cow dung - 5 kilo • Water - 5 litres • Cow milk - 2 litres • Curd - 2 litres • Clarified butter/ Ghee - 1 litre • Sugarcane juice - 2 litres (In place of sugarcane juice use 500gms of honey or 1 kg of jaggery or Palm sugar) Mix these ingredients in a mud pot and stir them well. Allow this mixture under shade for fermentation for about 3 weeks. Then take out 2 litres of Panchagavya and dilute it with 100 litres of water and spray the crops by using a power sprayer in 1 acre plot. The above mixture is sufficient for spraying 4 acres at the rate of 2 rounds per crop. The diluted mixture has to be stirred thoroughly for 20 minutes before spraying. This can be stored for another 1 month. It induces growth and enhances quick flowering. It gives resistance against pests and diseases. First spray at 25 days after transplanting paddy and second spray 2 weeks after 1 st spray. It has advanced paddy harvest by 10 days. Similarly spraying 2 rounds of Panchagavya once before the flower initiation and another during pod/fruit setting phase resulting in quick flowering and thereby the productivity. In Jasmine it ensures continuous flowering; and in Moringa tree with synchronized early flowering, it doubled the yield of Moringa Pods. It can be used for groundnut turmeric and many other crops. Seed materials can be dipped for few minutes and wet their root zone before planting. b. Panchagavya as a Pesticide: Ingredients: • Cow dung mixed with water - 500 ml • Cow’s urine - 300 ml • Cow’s milk - 200 ml • Curd - 200 ml • Ghee - 100 ml • Yellow plantain - 2 nos. • Coconut water - 300 ml TOTAL - 1500 ml Preparation: All the products mentioned above should be put in a mud pot, mixed and kept open for 10 days. It should be mixed every day. It is ready for use in 10 days time. JEEVAJALA – A Growth Regulator Ingredients: • Goat’s meat - 1 kg • Sesame - ¼ kg • Blackgram - ¼ kg • Cow’s milk - 1 litre • Mud pot (5 litres capacity) - 1 No. The goat’s meat should be washed properly and put in 5 liters of water and boiled till it reduces to half the quantity. After this the flesh should be removed and the extract alone should be filtered. Black gram and sesame should be properly powdered. The mixture of these powders should be mixed with the meat extract after it is cooled. After mixing this it should again be boiled. After boiling the mixture is cooled and then milk should be added. The mixture must be poured into the mud pot, and the mouth of the mud pot should be tied with a cloth. The pot should be buried under the ground or inside the compost pit. The extract should be mixed well atleast once a day. After 10 days of the fermentation, the extract should be removed, properly filtered and stored in a pot. This filtered extract can be applied near the roots or used as a spray. For application near the root zone, 3 litres of growth regulator is required. This should be applied near the irrigation channel so as to mix with the water. 500ml of extract should be mixed with 10 litres of water for use as a foliar spray. This is sprayed twice during the vegetative stage. By using this there is an increase in the number of grains per earhead and also a general increase in the yield. The weight of the grains also increases. After irrigating the field in which the seedlings are transplanted, the growth regulator can also be applied using a band sprayer on the surface of the water. **** .