Miracle-Gro Versus Scotts Fertilizer

Agriculture, horticulture, and many other botanical sciences depend upon timing and effective use of resources to create and sustain plant growth for personal enjoyment or for monetary profit. From commercial vegetable farms to personal flower gardens, plant growth varies based on an array of influences, from sunlight and amount of water to viability of soil. Most importantly, soil must be appropriately fertilized and nurtured in order to sustain plant life.

In a personal experiment of fertilizer performance, three fertilizer types (no fertilizer, Miracle-Gro, and Scotts) are implemented with two closely related plants (sugar snaps and snow peas). Twenty-four individual plants are grown in the experiment - four of each combination of plant and fertilizer. Additionally, each plant in the study receives the prescribed amount of fertilizer, and the same amount of water daily. However, some plant types may respond differently to various types of fertilizer. In addition to finding out which fertilizer works best for the given plant types, the product comparison also examines the interactions between the fertilizer and each plant type to determine if one type of fertilizer promotes more growth in a particular type of plant. Whether one is an amateur gardener or professional, knowing which type of fertilizer makes a particular plant's growth more vigorous and sustainable means the difference between no garden combined with no profit, a mediocre garden with an average profit, or a flourishing garden with increasing profits.

As shown by a simple observation of the plants at the end of the experiment, several preliminary ideas emerge. First, the mean height of sugar snaps gradually decreased from Miracle-Gro to Scotts to no fertilizer. On the other hand, the mean height of snow peas shows comparable Miracle-Gro performance as on the sugar snaps, yet drastically lower performance with Scotts. Furthermore, the snow pea plants with no fertilizer grew nearly five times as large as those fertilized with Scotts. Because of the hint of interaction, an in-depth statistical analysis may provide support for the observed trends.

While Miracle-Gro proved to be the best option for sugar snap pea fertilizer, it performed nearly the same as no fertilizer on snow peas. Likewise, even though Scotts fertilizer performed slightly worse than Miracle-Gro on sugar snap peas, Scotts proved, by far, to be the worst option for snow peas. However, this study stops short of identifying an overall, all-purpose fertilizer that enhances plant growth on a universal scale. Even though Miracle-Gro performed well on both sugar snap peas and snow peas, the variability of Scotts fertilizer indicates that a certain brand of fertilizer may perform drastically different depending on the type of plant being fertilized. Furthermore, as indicated by the growth of snow peas, fertilizer may not even be needed for successful plant growth.

The implications of this experiment suggest the concept that Miracle-Gro has a profound effect on sugar snap peas, but does not seem to have much of an effect on snow peas. On the other hand, Scotts fertilizer seems to have a negative effect on snow peas while having a positive effect on sugar snap peas, although not as much as the Miracle-Gro. As a result, the study suggests both amateurs and professionals must carefully select fertilizer brand, as brand seems to serve a vital role in the growth differences of sugar snap peas and snow peas. Whereas one brand of fertilizer may greatly enhance plant growth, it may have no effect (or possibly even inhibit) the growth of similar plants. However, it is interesting to note the vast difference among fertilizer performance on two seemingly similar plant types. Using this preliminary analysis, it would be desirable to not only repeat this experiment to compare statistical conclusions, but also to study the effects of the fertilizer brands on other related plants, as well.