I doubt anyone can say. No one knows the ingredients, except the originator.

As Jean says the label does not list the ingrediants so you cannot know what is in it and that means you cannot know whether it is acceptable as an organic product. If using this product, or anything similar, actually does improve the growth of your plants then your soil needs closer attention. If your soil is in a good, healthy condition this will do nothing to help your plants grow.

The ingredients are on every bottle I've ever bought- in tiny print. It contains vitamins and 1-naphthyl acetic acid-not organic I think.

I don't think we can categorically say that if you have good soil it won't affect growth, because the truth is, it can.

I had written a piece about 'Superthrive' based on my own experience. Someone from Stemma (an online magazine) saw it and asked if they could publish it. You may or may not find it of interest - skip it if you think you won't:

Superthrive or Superjivecolor>size>

The question regarding the value of Superthrive as a miracle tonic for plants is often bandied about in horticultural circles. Over the years, I had read claims that ranged from, "I put it on my plant, which had never bloomed, and it was in full bloom the next day." to, "It was dead - I put Superthrive on it and the next day it was alive and beautiful, growing better than it ever had before." I decided to find out for myself.

If you look for information on the net, you will probably only find the manufacturers claims and anecdotal observations, both so in want of anything that resembles a control. Though my experiments were far from purely scientific, I tried to keep some loose controls in place so that I could make a fair judgment of its value, based my own observations. Here is what I did, what I found, and the conclusions I made about any value the product Superthrive might hold for me.

On four separate occasions, I took multiple cuttings of plants in four different genera. In each case the group of cuttings were taken from the same individual plant to reduce genetic variance. The plant materials I used were: Ficus benjamina, (a tropical weeping fig) Luna apiculata (Peruvian myrtle), Chaenorrhinum minus (a dwarf snapdragon), and an unknown variety of Coleus. In each instance, I prepared cuttings from the same plant and inserted them in a very fast, sterile soil. The containers containing half of the cuttings were immersed/soaked in a Superthrive solution of approximately 1/2 tsp per gallon of water to the upper soil line. The other half of the cuttings were watered in with water only. In subsequent waterings, I would water the "Superthrive batch" of cuttings with a solution of 10 drops per gallon and the others with only water. The same fertilizer regimen was followed on both groups of cuttings. In all four instances, the cuttings that I used Superthrive on rooted and showed new growth first. For this reason, it follows that they would naturally exhibit better development, though I could see no difference in overall vitality, once rooted. I can also say that a slightly higher percentage of cuttings rooted that were treated with the Superthrive treatment at the outset. I suspect that is directly related to the effects of the auxin in Superthrive hastening initiation of root primordia before potential vascular connections were destroyed by rot causing organisms.

In particular, something I looked for because of my affinity for a compact form in plants was branch (stem) extension. (The writer is a bonsai practitioner.) Though the cuttings treated with Superthrive rooted sooner, they exhibited the same amount of branch extension. In other words, internode length was approximately equal and no difference in leaf size was noted.

As a second part to each of my "experiments", I divided the group of cuttings that had not been treated with Superthrive into two groups. One of the groups remained on the water/fertilizer only program, while the other group was treated to an additional 10 drops of Superthrive in each gallon of fertilizer solution. Again, the fertilizer regimen was the same for both groups. By summerÂs end, I could detect no difference in bio-mass or vitality between the two groups of plants.

Since I replicated the above experiment in four different trials, using four different plant materials, I am quite comfortable in drawing some conclusions as they apply to me and my growing habits or abilities. First, and based on my observations, I have concluded that Superthrive does hold value for me as a rooting aid, or stimulant if you prefer. I regularly soak the soil, usually overnight, of my newly root-pruned and often bare-rooted repots in a solution of 1/2 tsp Superthrive per gallon of water. Second, and also based on my observations, I no longer bother with its use at any time other than at repotting. No evidence was accumulated through the 4 trials to convince me that Superthrive was of any value as a "tonic" for plants with roots that were beyond the initiation or recovery stage.

Interestingly, the first ingredient listed as being beneficial to plants on the Superthrive label is vitamin B-1 (or thiamine). Growing plants are able to synthesize their own vitamin B-1 as do many of the fungi and bacteria having relationships with plant roots, so it's extremely doubtful that vitamin B-1 could be deficient in soils or that a growing plant could exhibit a vitamin B-1 deficiency.

Some will note that I used more of the product than suggested on the container. I wanted to see if any unwanted effects surfaced as well as trying to be sure there was ample opportunity for clear delineation between the groups. I suspect that if a more dilute solution was used, the difference between groups would have been even less clear.

It might be worth noting that since the product contains the growth regulator (hormone) auxin, its overuse can cause defoliation, at least in dicots. The broad-leaf weed killer Weed-B-Gone and the infamous "Agent Orange", a defoliant that saw widespread use in Viet Nam, are little more than synthetic auxin.

Al

Thanks for the info Al!

Superthrive is vitamin B1 and a rooting hormone, as is stated on the bottle. My understanding is that vitamin B1 is not approved for organic use. If you want to buy the identical ingredients and concentration, look for the Hi-Yield brand of Vitamin B1. Superthrive is $8.00 for 4 ounces. A gallon of Hi-Yield costs under $4.00. Wal-Mart has another brand of vitamin B1 for about the same price per gallon.

The education that I received - which included nursery culture - indicated that B-1 as insurance against 'transplant shock' or whatever was a byproduct of Madison Ave and not successful field or pot trials.

I've never used it and my survivorship is very high.

Dan

I think the transplant shock claim advertised on the Superthrive label comes from the rooting hormone they put in it. -could be wrong.

Very illustrative in showing that it does not work:

A comment from the manufacturers web site, " IS IT ORGANIC?
Superthrive is non-toxic, while it is natural, it cannot be certified as organic because some of the ingredients are made synthetically. In order to label a product as organic, all ingredients must follow OMRI guidelines."

http://www.superthrive.com/faq.html

kimmq is kimmsr

Linda Chalker-Scott, Ph.D, debunks Superthrive here.

Al