Springboks up in air over R.U.M.

From Zambia, Zimbabwe, Swaziland and South Africa, it appears our African cousins have joined 'The R.U.M. Rebellion' with enthusiasm. And we know they wouldn't give R.U.M. the time of day if they weren't getting results! Martin Van Rensburg, R.U.M.'s man-in-Africa, claims that in recent years many South African wheat farmers have been battling to fulfil the minimum 12% protein requirement. "But those who have used R.U.M. on their lands have seen protein increases of 1-2%! Neighbours whose crops have been rejected by the mills naturally want to know what's going on!", says Martin.

Susan Coetzee, MKTV extension officer examines the progress of R.U.M-grown tobacco

'Essential Oils' trade says R.U.M. "essential"

Two forward-looking South African research councils, CSIR and the ARC, have developed a project to encourage the growing of various herbs for the important European 'essential oils' market, supplier to the international perfume industry. Apart from the lavender, the oils from marjoram, pelargoniums and others are used.

Two farmers involved in this project, Hennie du Plessis from Barbeton and Deon Buys from Vaalwater are both R.U.M. enthusiasts. "It's really easy to apply through the pivot boom spray. And we are now harvesting our herbs four times a year instead of three", says Deon.

That's a 33% increase in yield, folks. And, apparently, the distillers say the oil quality is excellent.

Deon Buys applied R.U.M. to his crop of pelargoniums at both 8L/ha and 16L/ha. No wonder oil quality is excellent!

R.U.M. nicely 'on the nose'!

We were all very impressed when one of the largest wholesale nurseries in South Africa, 'Rosendal Farms', decided to expand some R.U.M. trials they had been conducting. Initially, trials were carried out on three blocks of 3 inch pots of lavender, growing in a medium of peat, compost and granular fertiliser. Leaving one block as a 'control', the other two blocks were each lightly sprayed once with Beaulieu R.U.M. Liquid Plant Food. The first block with a 1% and the second with a 2% R.U.M./water dilution. After only 3 weeks of growth under controlled conditions, the difference was quite noticeable. As the photograph shows, the R.U.M.-treated sample on the left, exhibits about 50% stronger growth than the lavender sample grown only in Rosendal's usual medium, on the right. Needless to say, more extensive trials have been commissioned.

R.UM. 'tops' on South African fruit

Martin Van Rensburg also reports that tree and vine crops have all responded well to applications of R.U.M.. "Bananas, papino, paprika and passionfruit are just a few, and the quality has been superb", he said.

A cool-looking trellis of R.U.M.-treated passionfruit shows good vigour and high yield.