Does anyone know the shelf life of this calcium concentrate once it is made? I don't want to make it too early if it doesn't store well.

forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/soil/msg0422555019136.html

It's a long thread so here are a couple of the replies (I am using the start keys instead of quotes because I am typing this on my cell phone and for some reason the quotation marks turn to apostraphes.also, I tried to space the quotes with plenty of space in between but when I hit preview all the spaces I made are not there):

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Maybe try the 'recipe' for a bionutrient brew for calcium phosphate. Simplified:

1. Roast/toast eggshells.
2. Soak roasted eggshells in equal volume of vinegar for two weeks until the vinegar dissolves the eggshells.
3. Dilute 1:20 parts water and spray on plants or water into plants.
4. Note below that this is best used during a specific period in the plants growth, just before flowering/fruiting.

This is from the BIM piece posted on an earlier thread:

'Calcium Phosphate

A lot of agriculture advisers have used calcium phosphate for better plant growth, health, pest and disease controls. Natural farmers use this very specific bionutrient. Under the theory of Nutrioperiodism developed by a Japanese horticulturist, Yasushi Inoue in the 1930�s, plants and animals need a very specific nutrient relative to the stage of their development. In the plant, there is the essential vegetative growth , changeover and the reproductive periods. In animals, like humans, there is the infantile, juvenile and adulthood. It is not only critical to provide the right nutrient at the right stage of the development, but also critical to use or apply specific nutrient of calcium phosphate in the juvenile or changeover period. For the plant, for example, we know that nitrogen is critical on the vegetative stage as potassium is critical in the flowering and fruiting stages. It is however, the changeover period that is most critical that will determine the quality of the final reproductive stage. At this stage, an additional nutrient is badly needed by the plant. And this is calcium phosphate. Calcium phosphate is good for plants� 'morning sickness'. It is the stage that additional baby needs to be fed or the process where flower/fruit is about to come. Ash made from soybean stems are excellent for this purpose.

Here is a simple, natural method of generating calcium phosphate. Get eggshells and roast them enough to generate some good ashes. Afterwhich, dip these roasted eggshells on about equal visual volume of vinegar. Allow it to sit for a couple of weeks until eggshells are practically broken down by the vinegar acids. You may use this diluted 20 parts water and can be sprayed or watered to the plants during the changeover period.

When this is applied to that changeover period, it will improve plant health and productivity. The use of calcium phosphate is important to natural farmers. This however, does not mean that we shall forget the nutrient timing application of other critical nutrients for plant growth both macro and micro nutrients, given at the right stages and combinations.

We consider this very important bionutrient needed by the plants used by natural farmers.***

And some comments and replies about the ph of it:

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I'd love to try the 'recipe' above to dissolve my eggshells quickly and water them into the soil.

I am a bit wary of adding vinegar to the soil, even diluted.

Is it possible I could add something to the eggshell water after the shells have dissolved like baking soda in order to bring the pH closer to neutral? If so, are there any chemistry people out there who could tell me a ratio of vinegar to baking soda? ***

******** ******** ******** ******** Hamiltongardener...
After bopping around the net this morning, I'm going out on a limb to suggest that the pH might be sort of neutral. I don't have any litmus paper to test my current little experiment here but here's what I found out:

The vinegar is acidic, the egg shell is alkaline. When the eggshell dissolves in the acid (I think you need more than 1 tsp--perhaps enough to cover your crushed eggshells) you are left with something called calcium acetate. (Free calcium ions floating around in the vinegar.) If left exposed to the air it will form crystals.***

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Thanks Penny,

I think you might be right. I put a little vinegar in a container with my eggshells and they started dissolving for about a day. I've left it since Monday but there has been no further dissolving that I have been able to see. So tonight, I drained the vinegar off the eggshells and carefully mixed a little baking soda into it. Nothing, not even fizz. So I mixed a little more. Still nothing. The vinegar was cloudy and full of eggshell powder, I could see teeny tiny bits of the brown eggshells still.

I'm guessing that the eggshells did bring the vinegar to neutral and once it reached that state, the vinegar was not acid enough to keep dissolving the eggshells, and that's why baking soda would not even get it to bubble. Think I'm right?

I took that little bit of vinegar, mixed it with a full watering can of water, and put it on one of my garden beds. I've added more vinegar to the eggshells that were left over. They are now happily bubbling away and dissolving right before my eyes with the fresh vinegar.***

But if you want to waste the energy and need to know how long it will store then likely the only person who can answer the question is the guy who originally posted the recipe/instructions.

Dave

A lot of the negative comments were about putting egg shells in compost or mixed in with soil and them still being intact a year later...

I wonder if I should even be worried about calcium?

I have been using a pelletised slow-release fertilizer that has calcium in it... but even on the company website they advise to also use their water soluble fertilizer as well, which they do not sell here.

Would fish fertilizer, which is the only organic water soluble fertilizer I have seen here in Dubai (they sell it st the fish market), have calcium in it?

I am also using a water soluble seaweed fertilizer and also bat guano (the bat guano's npk is 3-10-1)

Does that all seem to be enough fertilizing?

Do you have indications that your soil lacks fertility? I don't think any of us have gardened in Dubai before, so we know nothing about the soil structure, composition, or fertility.

What was growing in your garden before you decided to grow veggies in it?

Bat guano usually has significant calcium in it, so it is likely that a little bit of guano will have you covered.

This has been discussed here often as it is an old wives tale with no basis in science. Yet some continue to claim that it cures everything from A to Z. At best, egg shells added to the compost work ok as a slug deterrent.

Dave

I crush my eggshells with mortar and pestle. From there, they are divided between three uses:

1. Mixed with the chicken feed
2. Mixed into the homemade bird suet
3. Mixed into the wheat bran & dehydrated milk for the mealworm bedding.

Mealworms are fed to the chickens, and the waste from the mealworm process goes into the vermiculture operation.

Vermicompost goes back to the garden.

Chicken poop (after composting) goes back to the garden.

Oh,I forgot to add, I also have Sea bird guano as well that I can add to fertilize.

as for the myth about egg shells...I had thought people incorrectly thought crushed egg shells mixed into soil provides calcium... I didn't know that people are also saying that egg shells provide no benefit... I will have to read some more :) it gets confusing with all the different advice out there...

As for dolomite lime...I will have to look for it. I thought I saw it at the gardening stores last growing season but didn't know what it was for and didn't but any. So far I haven't seen it here this growing season.

I usually get at the most 3 or 4 (total from several plants) unripe tomatoes with ber at the first part of the season, then no more.

I think many growers make too big a deal of adding calcium to combat ber. If you do some forum searching you'll find that ber can be caused by calcium intake problems within the plant that may have nothing to do with available calcium in the growing medium.

So, you are either going to get BER, or you won't and nothing you do will change it.

Betsy

There was no dolomite lime at the big garden center here though.

bets, thank you for that info... now I am thinking I might just hope that what I am feeding my tomato plant is enough for now and see what happens. It will be a learning experience for me to hopefully be able to successfully grow more tomato varieties next season.

Those of you that still have questions about this,
web search: "egg shells and lemon juice" or make your own "calcium citrate". Much information is available about this concerning the nutritional benefit.

Those of you that still have questions about this,
web search: "egg shells and lemon juice" or make your own "calcium citrate".

Much information is available about this.

(In response to previous posts some time ago)

Although this growing season was abnormal to say the least, I harvested more this year than last even though the heat was worse and lasted longer.Used shadecloth for the first time and will never be without it again.

Not one fruit with ber. No lime, calcium whatever added. Just good old Tomato Tone in potting mix.