by pa_friendly_guy » Fri Aug 17, 2012 2:40 am
Many years ago I was in charge of the tree planting program in our small town. After the trees were planted The Business District Authority planted flowers around the base of every tree to beautify the shopping district for the summer. A friend of mine was out of work so I hired him to plant the flowers for us. This was over 25 years ago and I had just heard about those polymer crystals that hold water. Some of the merchants were good about watering the flowers everyday in front of their store, others, not so much. You could really tell the difference as to who watered and who did not. So we bought a bunch of those little crystal hickeys and gave them to Sam to use when he planted the flowers. They were very new at the time, they had just come out on the market, so we didn't know anything about them. Well, when Sam planted the flowers he sprinkled those little white crystals around the plants like they were salt. When he watered they ExPLODED, I mean they Blew up and popped right out of the ground. It looked like little clear marshmellows everywhere. They look weird like that, little jelly things all around the top of the ground. We did discover that if you wet them 1st and spaded them down into the ground they worked WAY better. At that time they claimed a 5 year life for the crystals, I see that they are claiming a 12 year life now. They are much improved. I do not know what happens to them when they break down with time. I wouldn't think they are very organic, but because of saving water they maybe considered very Green.
Never doubt that a small group of dedicated people can change the world, indeed it is the only thing that ever has.