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Liqui-Dirt Review
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Is Liqui-Dirt a fertilizer? Based on the description that is placed on the bottle it is easy to assume it is a fertilizer of some sort. As a soil scientist, I am excited to see what exactly is in Liqui-Dirt and whether or not it is worth the money. This is the ultimate liqui-dirt review.
If you are new to this blog my name is Ashley and I am a soil scientist. I am located in a Canadian Zone 3 and a USDA Zone 4. I write articles, make YouTube videos, Instagram & Facebook posts all designed for Canadians and Cold Climate gardeners using science-based methods. If you are looking for anything specific be sure to let me know in the comments down below.
Liqui-Dirt claims to be a full ecosystem in a bottle that can be used for all things imaginable from reptile enclosures to fish tanks and of course plants. The company says that it has all the essential micro and macronutrients combined with mycorrhizae & rhizobacteria strains in a pH-neutral formula that never expires.
How is Liqui-Dirt made?
The company says it’s made through a Zymology process that takes 18 different ingredients and breaks them down into thousands of readily absorbable elements. With the entire process taking over 5 years to fully complete. Zymology is the study of fermenting products to produce a mass influx of microbes. A liqui-dirt review would not be complete without seeing how its made.
This is something similar to what we do with Bokashi composting. During a fermenting process, we are encouraging decomposition with microbes that survive without the presence of oxygen. The end result will result in some based nutrients being released and a fertilizer similar to that of regular compost. It’s not “more potent” or special in any way just a different way of getting the same result.
The only setback of using fermenting as a process of decomposition is that anaerobic microbes do not survive in aerobic conditions. This means once they are exposed to potting soil or soil conditions it’s unlikely that they will continue to thrive.
Liqui-Dirt Microbes
Liqui-Dirt says that the product contains rhizobacteria & mycorrhizae. I will give them the benefit of the double and assume this is added after the fermentation process. This is because these microbes do not do well in the absence of oxygen. The packaging being in a sealed plastic bag is also semi concerning but this tends to be in the industry standard. There is not enough data to suggest that this potential anaerobic environment will lessen the Colony Forming Units (CFU) within the product.
The lack of microbe information on the product label is not a Liqui-Dirt specific issue. It is an industry issue that I am hoping turns around at some point. When it comes to any sort of microbe inoculant the industry standard should be to list the minimum CFU’s. I have found one product that is made by microbiologists that actually contains this information.
When doing liqui-dirt review its a must to look at the microbe additions.
Do The 18 Balanced Super Nutrients Matter?
Liquid-Dirt listed 18 different products that they call super nutrients. So first I want to clarify something, plants don’t eat “food”. Plants also do not all the elements of the periodic table to thrive nor can they even absorb them. Plants have very specific nutrient needs and there are only 17 elements/nutrients that scientists have deemed essential. The form these nutrients are delivered in means nothing to the plant.
Plants will absorb organic and inorganic the same sources the exact same way. What is meant by this is that by the time the nutrients are bioavailable to the plant the original sources don’t matter. It’s all inorganic elements that have been decomposed and degraded.
The 18 super nutrients used in Liqui-Dirt include the following:
- Poultry Litter
- Rabbit Manure
- Bat Guano
- Cricket Fras
- Humic Shale
- Worm Castings
- Oyster Shell
- Mycorrhizae
- Dolomite limes
- Kelp Meal
- Gypsum
- Alfalfa meal
- Concentrated Fulvic Acid
- Blood meal
- Proprietary mineral blend from organic sources.
This is inconsequential when it comes to fertilizer unless you are marketing the product as a soil amendment or conditioner. If all these products were mixed into a single biologically active aerobic product it would be a major bonus. This would add a diverse range of microbial activity that would be beneficial to the soil biome. However, Liqui-Dirt is a nanoparticulate that is a small representative of the original conglomerate of products. This does make me question the purpose of the wide range of inputs. The only purpose for this would be for covering the basis of all 17 essential nutrients. This may be the case here when doing a liqui-dirt review.
Is Liqui-Dirt A Fertilizer?
Simply put according to Agriculture & Agri-Foods Canada it is not a fertilizer. I am not going to go into too much detail here other than fertilizers need to list their levels. The same rules apply to convention fertilizers as they do to organic fertilizers. The fertilizer regulations require you to state all soluble nutrients on the labelling this includes macro and micronutrients. For more on this along with the exemptions, list check out this link here.
Without this information listed, I can not in good faith tell you this is a fertilizer. I can advocate and say it may have bio stimulate properties but still requires fertilizer to be used. If you use the product and do not notice any fertilizer deficiencies this is likely due to the fact that very rarely are soils heavily deficient. More often than not our soil has enough nutrients present to sustain our plants. This is due to natural decomposition that takes place regardless of additives that are applied.
Is Liqui-Dirt Organic Certified?
No, Liqui-Dirt is not OMRI certified as of February 2022. This means it can not be used in an organic certified operation, nor can the products produced by soil treated with Liqui-Dirt be sold as organic. Liqui-Dirt uses organically sourced products meaning high carbon content from the earth products. The issue is that we don’t know if the rabbits, as an example, were fed organic fed or alfalfa sprayed with glyphosate. This, unfortunately (despite even my objection to it) is the rule when it comes to organically certified products.
There are several organic certified products that are on the edge or truly organic such as humic acid. Liqui-Dirt in my opinion should be considered organic based on the ingredients list. However, we do not make the rules and governing bodies require the process on OMRI certification to take place. Again this is at the time of this liqui-dirt review.
Is Liqui-Dirt Worth The Purchase?
If you are using this as solely a fertilize I will have to say no it is not. If you are using this as a bio stimulant in a small system that is devoid of organic inputs (houseplants) then it maybe beneficial. Without a CFU label and having no double nutrient labelling it is impossible for me to tell you what the product really even does. But what I can assume with a certain degree of certianty is that it contains high levels of carbon.
This carbon will stimulate microbial activity in the soil and therefore the nutrient cycling, pest fighting abilities. The carbon influx combined with the fact that you are likely watering your plants more often is never a bad thing. I find houseplants owners in particular to have a rather “dead” soil and therefore the use of this product is likely to have some pretty stellar results.
Liqui-Dirt Review
Ultimately the choice is yours and experimentation is one the joys of plants. If you are looking for a fun experiment then this maybe a great place to look. Liqui-dirt will not harm your plants but I simply do not see anything to suggest it is a total solution. Therefore I suggest the use of fertilzer and other microbe innoculents in conjunction with Liqui-Dirt.
