# Wet Sol



## Three44s (May 21, 2016)

I did a search a number of times and can't find any threads on the subject so here goes:

About 5 years ago, we discovered that our deep irrigation well has been producing a fair amount of sodium. An early water test showed calcium carbonate and some sulphur but the well was deepened about three years after the initial construction and that's apparently where we picked up the sodium salt.

We are on a calcareous silt loam and our pH runs to the low "8's" if we sit on our hands.

After the new water test revelations, we tested a product called Water Max which Crop Production Services sells. We saw positive results.

But if something is costing a pretty penny, I always am on the lookout for a less expensive alternative ....... and that's how I came to find a product called Wet Sol by Schaefer Oil.

There are a number of these products on the market and what they all share in common is that they are surfactants and that you apply them either by a sprayer or more often through your irrigation water ....... mostly sprinklers but certainly furrow and it would miss my guess that you could also do it by drip but don't take my word on that ...... you better be sure of drip before you risk your investment in lines and installation.

Now, I also see positive results with Wet Sol and another positive ........ is that the wallet is not hurt nearly as much ....... a gallon of it runs about $11.00 and will do an acre for an initial start up .......... one generally follows that up with a half gallon later in the season. Some use more ........... some use less.

One other thing besides better water penetration I have noticed is that phosphorus is available faster at lower rates than without Wet Sol. The same is said about nitrogen but I don't use N on our alfalfa ground.

Simply put when I combine Wet Sol with a stingy dry fertillizer program consisting of #100 of S, #30 of P and a good blast of Boron and Zinc I have seen amazing results.

Best regards

Three 44s


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

So just what does the wet sol do to counteract the sodium?

We just don't have salinity problems here like some places.


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## Three44s (May 21, 2016)

mlappin said:


> So just what does the wet sol do to counteract the sodium?
> 
> We just don't have salinity problems here like some places.


Salts move with the net flow of water and with the course of evaporation and plant use, the salts accumulate in the root zone and more readily at or near the soil surface.

As they worsen, the plant can be physically standing in water yet physilogically be in a drought condition.

A surfactant is said to reduce the attraction of the salts to rise towards the surface because they are improving water penetration.

But I like to hedge my bets as it were ......... I approach a salt problem with as many tools as I can ...... Now don't get me wrong ....... I am not professing to be some sort of expert ...... I consider myself a mere student on the topic.

Personally, I like elemental sulfur and I have even experimented with Simplot's Soil Cal, though I have reservations about applying it long term since it contains chlorine ....... calcium chloride ..... the idea is that the calcium as it peels away from the chlorine then bumps the sodium in to a movable status.

So the desired goal here is to first create a physical reason for the unwanted salts to leach downwardly and then through chemical reactions to make the sodium free up for the leaching to be more effective.

Ultimately what has to happen is the sodium needs to be leached clear of our soil profile (which I don't think will happen) or we just put up with the overall condition ........ that is not good either ............. OR ........... we figure out a crop that extracts sodium ........... and I think I have found such a crop that is beneficial to our ranch .......

........ something that fits with cows ...........

So far it's looking like Sudan grass may fit the bill!

Three 44s


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## IHCman (Aug 27, 2011)

ND has areas with naturally occuring high salinity. Wet years seem to really bring the salts up, then when it drys up the salts are left behind. Lowering the water table would help through tiling, but no where to drain the water to around here. No one would want that salty water anyway. Some crops like barley, sunflowers, and oats can handle and help reduce salinity a bit. If its to big of a problem for those crops to grow, then seeding it into a salt tolerant grass might help. Intermediate wheat grass is what I've used in the past on those spots. Our local NRCS guy wants me to try Garrison Creeping Foxtail. I think I'm gonna plant that in a few lower spots next year. There are salt tolerant varieties of alfalfa, though I don't think they would work for me as most of the spots around here that are salty tend to have standing water in the spring that would kill the alfalfa.


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## Three44s (May 21, 2016)

IHCman,

I have heard of Garrison Creeping Foxtail and we have a pasture with Intermediate in it ..... our natural precipitation is on the lean side for it but it survives.

Years ago, my father bought a D9 with a ripper ......... later we upgraded it to a 4 barrel parrallelagram and had the outgoing Cat dealer include a humungus long shank with it. This shank was actually meant for a D10 and the tool holders would not accept it but with some judicious work with an arc air torch he opened up the center position for it. We have subsoiled as deep as just shy of 5 feet with it but it sure sucks up the dinosaurs when you do that.

I am anxious to pair Wet Sol, other soil amendments and that big Cat together to see what we can do to the ever present caliche layer we have here!

Best regards

Three 44s


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## Hugh (Sep 23, 2013)

The proven treatment for sodium heavy soils is to apply gypsum. The calcium in the gypsum will tie up the sodium (cation exchange) and delete its effect in the soil. This had been known for 200+ years. Thomas Jefferson used gypsum, and back then it was known as "land plaster." According to their website, WetSol is a surfactant. How does WetSol tie-up the sodium, especially at 1 gallon per acre?


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## Three44s (May 21, 2016)

Hugh,

I have had good luck with elemental S as well. Our soils and water are both loaded with CaCO3 so we already own a lot of Ca.

It's not free until the S works for a while though and that's why the Soil Cal may help. It gives you a quick dose of free Ca to work with the Wet Sol.

The Wet Sol does not tie up the Na ........ it reduces surface tension until it (wet sol) breaks down. The sodium moves downward with irrigation water as the tension is reduced.

I do admit I need to work with gypsum but S has worked for better than 20 years for us.

Best regards

Three 44s


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## vhaby (Dec 30, 2009)

Here we go again. Something that at a gallon per acre claims to eliminate the harmful effects of sodium in soil by reducing the surface tension of water. For sodium to move down through the soil there must be a replacing cation like calcium available to exchange sodium off the cation exchange complex. The cation exchange complex of soil has a net negative charge that will attract positive charged sodium and hold it until a more strongly charged cation, or a large amount of some other positive charged cation, is made available to exchange the sodium off the clay and into the soil solution from which it moves to the next clay particle. Calcium from solubilized calcium carbonate or gypsum will exchange with sodium. Wet sol contains no calcium and is claimed to be a surfactant. Research does not bear out the claims for the benefits of spraying wet sol on soils. See the following report from university test results:

http://www.sbreb.org/research/soil/soil08/StudiesWestsol.pdf


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## Three44s (May 21, 2016)

vhaby said:


> Here we go again. Something that at a gallon per acre claims to eliminate the harmful effects of sodium in soil by reducing the surface tension of water. For sodium to move down through the soil there must be a replacing cation like calcium available to exchange sodium off the cation exchange complex. ...........................................


vhaby,

Thank you for your reply.

That said, your opening statement speaks volumes ........... "here we go again" .........

You'd think I was touting snake oil!

And the fact is ......... Schaefer Oil is far from the only company marketing a surfactant ..... are they all charaletins?

The thing that really stands out is you blow past everything else I post here about the use of Sulfur or adding Ca in the form of Soil Cal and expouse the same tack I took in the first place ........ that it takes a holistic approach .......

I have even mentioned deep ripping to alleviate physical compaction and hard pans!

Quite frankly, I could not give a ......... whether anyone tries the product ......... because it DOES for us what it does ..........

I like to offer ideas to folks that are willing to try new things and am not so greedy as to not share experiences. If folks don't want to experiment ............. I am perfectly fine to leave them to that.

When I first tried this class of chemicals, I too was skeptical ........ I tried side by side tests with side roll sprinklers. And I measured yield increases, just with Water Max ( a competing surfactant).

Things really got rolling when I went to a few strips treated to a few left untreated ......... the following year. At that point I had taken the plunge and went from the 2qts to 4 qts of Wet Sol .............

We saw exactly what our area's distributor predicted: Reduction or elimination of dry spots!

.......... and that was largely on ground that received nothing else ............ just Wet Sol.

On the ground that got top dressed with 100# S, 30# P, Boron and Zinc plus Wet sol ......... all after the first cutting of 12 bales per row was taken off to skyrocket to right around 30 bales per row in the second.

I was pretty disgusted with a Washington State Univ. trial of this class of products ...... they came right out and admitted they only tested water loving soils ........

.............. WHAT FOOLS! ...............

The point of a surfactant is to use it on a hydrophobic soil ........... one you just can't seem to keep wet!

I graduated from that school ........... but I am not above calling it like is!

I'd never suggest that anyone just dive into something new ........... I didn't ............ but once I found the square peg fit the round hole ........... I dug deeper and am very glad I took that first step and the next .............

In the North Dakota experiment, the point these folks miss is that you have to involve irrigation .......... and inch here and a half an inch there is not going to do anything justice. Here in the West when we irrigate .......... we are talking water ......... if you've got a water hating soil ..... you can water till you are blue in the face in many instances and turn off the water for just a few days and you've got dry spots .......... but put on a surfactant at a rate that will do some good along with all that water and in my exerience, you have a game changer.

Best regards

Three 44s


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

Careful there, might want to read vhaby's profile.


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## Three44s (May 21, 2016)

I did read his profile ......... and he could read my posts in their entirety.

I laid out a case that Wet Sol was more effective with other ammendments early on in this thread and he ignored that and went straight at Wet Sol.

Three 44s


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## Hugh (Sep 23, 2013)

I think the company "wetsol" ought to fund some research. Wetsol ought to get with a California university (I suggest U of Cal Davis) to test this stuff on the sodic soils in California. California has many thousands of acres that are sodium rich, and hinder agriculture to a great extent. Sodium binds the soils there by defloculatation, that is, by separating the clay particles and preventing them from prilling. Gypsum is used by the hundreds of thousands of tons to overcome this problem. If Wetsoil were to give the agronomy department the funds for an agronomist and a couple of assestents to do the testing, I'm sure they would go for it. If there is a problem with getting them to do this, i can (at no charge) get a university to test this for them. I personally know several Phd's from Montana State University (one was at my place this afternoon) and can find out for you in a few days. If Wetsol is this good, it will be worth BILLIONS of dollars worldwide, it will change agriculture in a huge way, prevent starvation for hundreds of millions of people.


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## Three44s (May 21, 2016)

Hugh,

That sounds like a great idea!

The company is Schaeffer Oil ....... they have been around for over 175 years and are still family owned.

Here's the main contact page:

http://www.schaefferoil.com/contact-us.html

This is the phone number of the distributor and my source:

Tyco International

Moses Lake, WA

(509) 765-5163 and (509) 765-0555

One of those is the office and the other the wharehouse ........ right off hand, I don't remember which one because I always call their on the road salesman and he makes the arraingements for delivery.

The boss's name is Ty and he's over 80 years old and keeps working sales and support and travels as far as Montana or did so at least recently. He actually pioneered the soil amendment use of Wet Sol. You see the parent company would not listen to him at first ..... this was over 35 years ago .... they told him to shut up and just sell oil! He was too stuborn to be silenced and after many testimonials by growers ....... the company woke up. The rest is history. Ty is also a former college teacher and has farmed as I recall.

As far as trials go, I think the two huge mistakes the Universities have commited in prior tests are this: Either they dig up somebodies dirt and scramble it in a test tube or column or they use it on dry land and think natural moisture is going to do something .........

Here's the folley ........ salts accumulate in the greatest concentrations right at or very near the surface ....... you scramble someone's dirt and you have eliminated the salt issue physically for a bit of time ...... certainly for a longer time than the experiment will be conducted.

The water issue is due to the fact that any salt dispersal from the surface is going to necessitate a mass downward water flow ...... a inch here and a .75 in rain there is just a lick and a promise ....... you bring a typical irrigation application of 24 hours with a side roll sprinkler line or better yet (where it works) flood irrigation and now you've set the stage where Wet Sol or a competing product and there are several can work.

And it's not an extraordinary amount of irrigation water ..... it's regular practice.

In my opinion, a real test requires testing in a real world environment. This would require access to someone's farm(s) or a school's farm AND an irrigated one that is geared to applying enough water per set to reach the 4 to 6" in 24 hours that I think is required at the onset.

Finally, as I have repeatedly stated, Wet Sol though it works by itself to varying degrees depending on circumstances ........ does a lot more good work when it's augmented with other proven practices thus those practices should also be integrated into the test regiment.

Best regards

Three 44s


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## Hugh (Sep 23, 2013)

44's, I'll pass this on to the guys I know.


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## Three44s (May 21, 2016)

Hugh,

Very good

Thanks and best regards

Three 44s


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## Hugh (Sep 23, 2013)

Looking over this thread I see VHABY linked to a site that already teated Wetsol (NDSU), so a university has already tested Wetsol. Another material that looks far superior can be found here: http://www.helenachemical.com/upl/downloads/about-us/success-stories/learn-more.pdf


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## Three44s (May 21, 2016)

Hugh,

I thank you for your efforts

Best regards

Three 44s


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## Three44s (May 21, 2016)

I went back the re-read some of this study on Wet Sol:

http://www.sbreb.org/research/soil/soil08/StudiesWestsol.pdf

It should be noted that the school conducting this study chose to apply the product at only 12.5% of it's recommended rate. ....... that's just 1/8 strength!

A pint is no gallon!

And as I have written earlier, they also relied on natural precipitation ......... it takes irrigation.

I tested Wet sol at 2 qts and it failed ...... I ran it at the main rate of 1 gallon the following season and it worked very well ....... all with irrigation water.

I have tested Wet Sol at 2 gallons per acre on successive irrigations in a few sets and achieved even better results ........

But the best results thus far ......... and I have alluded to it several times in this thread is to team the surfactant with other conventional treatments.

I don't suggest anyone looking at Wet Sol go and apply it on a large scale ......... I didn't ........ why would I urge others to do so ........ what I do suggest is that anyone having salt troubles get a respectable sample of it and apply it at a substantative rate .........

........... one/eight the recommended dose on the part of the ND school is a shame ......... and puzzling.

Fellow member Hugh offered this product as a better answer to salt problems:

http://www.helenachemical.com/upl/downloads/about-us/success-stories/learn-more.pdf

Actually we would all better recognize this today as Humic and Fulvic acid.

I was introduced to these back in '07 but not the Helena product. When I tried it I got one REAL good hit on a 2 acre test strip but it was compounded with other ingredients. The other test strips were unconclusive without the other ingredients. Sadly, my supplier of these products changed sources and can't duplicate the good hit I experienced.

I have used Humic acid since in other venues ........ mainly dry applied with conventional fertilizer.

I think Humic and Fulvic acids have a bright future as we better understand what they really do.

It's really helpful that so many of these newer products actually compliment one another.

Best regards

Three 44s


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