Akinson Tumbure
Eoghan Corbett- Horticulture Development Department, Ashtown Food Research Centre, Dublin, Ireland
Introduction: The exploration of local resources as growing media alternatives to peat and coir for soft fruit production is essential to improve self-sufficiency and environmental sustainability.
Methods: The agronomic performance of novel formulations of wood fiber plus 20%/40% biochar (3 types), 50% composted green waste (2 types), 50% bark (2 types), and 20% quarry filter-cake (1 type) were compared with coir, peat and rockwool. The two cropping cycle strawberry experiment involved re-use of growing media and replanting with new strawberry plants in the second year.
Results: For both production cycles, there were no statistical differences between class 1, class 2, and total marketable berry yields per plant between the various growing media. A similar trend was observed for berry count per plant, biomass and chlorophyll content. However, in the first production cycle, a 50% composted green waste mix, a 20% quarry filter-cake mix, and a 40% biochar mix produced significantly smaller berries than coir. The same 20% quarry filter-cake mix also produced strawberry above-ground biomass with significantly less phosphorus (P) content than the coir control, while the same 40% biochar mix produced biomass with significantly less calcium (Ca) content than coir.
Discussion: Results reveal that wood fiber containing alternative growing media has good potential for commercial use and minor adaptations are needed. However, these present complex relationships in the root zone that not only affect irrigation regimes and water uptake but also nutrient uptake. The differences in the materials were evident even when the growing media are fertigated with the same nutrient solution and fertigation frequency. Further studies on optimization of alternative growing media through altering irrigation frequencies and fertigation solutions are required.
1 Introduction
Strawberries grown under protected production (in polythene tunnels or glasshouses) dominate the soft fruit production industry in Ireland that has a value of more than €50 million per year. Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine figures would indicate that nearly all strawberry production in Ireland is conducted in growing media, under protection (Board Bia, 2013). More than 8000 tons of fresh strawberries are produced each year from a conservative commercial yield of roughly 450 g/plant (Kehoe, 2020). Assuming a tabletop production system common in Ireland, the 8000 tons of fruit per year are produced from about 17.8 million plants, grown in an estimated 1.27 - 2.22 million 16 L troughs (8–14 plants per 1 m long trough) using about 20,317 – 35,555 m3 of growing media in total. This annual growing media requirement for strawberry production is largely satisfied by the coir that is imported from Asia. While the current supply of coir is economically and logistically efficient, it is prudent to assess locally available materials that could serves as alternatives for coir in the context of increasingly unstable global markets and a drive towards closed loop, circular economy-based production systems. A recent review by Tumbure et al. (2025) estimated the bio-resources available in significant quantities for potential use as growing media in Ireland to come mainly from forests (~489k m3), field crop residues (~790k m3), composted green wastes (~201k m3), and spent mushroom compost (~274k m3). It is therefore essential to assess how some of these locally available resources could be used as alternative growing media for strawberry production in various processed forms (fibers, composts, or biochars).
In addition to improving environmental sustainability, there are also potential agronomic benefits of including bio-resources such as wood fiber in growing media. For instance, the hydrophilic nature of wood fiber improves rewetting, and the overall water retention of growing media compared to peat especially after a period of drying (Michel et al., 2021; Schulker et al., 2021). Schulker and Jackson (2023) observed that increasing wood fiber content in growing media with peat, increased speed of water capture and amount of water imbibed through surface irrigation. Wood fiber could suppress certain diseases as observed by Poleatewich et al. (2022), where radish plants grown in wood fiber had significantly lower damping-off disease severity compared to those grown in peat–perlite growing media. Wood fiber, especially that made from pine wood, has low cation exchange capacity (CEC) and poor pH buffering (Jackson, 2018) which presents a good opportunity to mix with high CEC materials such as biochars and composts.
Recent research on growing media for strawberry that incorporates biochars mainly focuses on small pot (≤ 3L) grown crops using peat combined with biochar (De Tender et al., 2016; Amery et al., 2021b; Iacomino et al., 2023), results of which may only be loosely extrapolated to commercial conditions. The few studies that use commercial-like protected crop, table top settings with biochar growing media formulations are limited to peat reduced growing media and low application rates of biochar ~10% v/v (Vandecasteele et al., 2023a, b). A significant amount of research focuses on wood fiber because it is generally available as a low value byproduct of sawmills. For instance, Depardieu et al. (2016) explains that in Canada, wood fiber is the cheapest source of biomass and worldwide the market of wood fiber as a component of growing media is expanding due to its renewability and reduced carbon footprint (Michel et al., 2021). Previous researchers expressed the good potential of wood fiber containing growing media albeit using different formulations due to local availability. For example, yields comparable with commercial growing media were reported for 25:75 compost: wood fiber growing media Aurdal et al. (2022), 50:50 peat: wood fiber growing media (Woznicki et al., 2023a), and 70:30 peat: sawdust growing media (Depardieu et al., 2016). While there is good potential for incorporating high amounts of wood fiber in strawberry growing media, differences in source of wood fiber should also be considered. For instance, Norway spruce is more inert as wood fiber than other tree species (Woznicki et al., 2023a) which could make it more ideal than other tree species for growing media. In the Irish context, potential available forest resources for use as wood fiber are largely from Sitka spruce (Tumbure et al., 2025). There is therefore a need to assess the agronomic effectiveness of the locally available wood fiber and composted green wastes as growing media components in semi-commercial protected crop settings.
While there are few strawberry agronomy experiments using semi-commercial protected production settings with biochar addition rates above 10% v/v, and or peat-free formulations as explained previously, much fewer studies incorporate reuse of growing media for a second production cycle. This contrasts with common farmer practice where the current standard growing media used (coir) is reused at least for a second cropping cycle to save on costs, particularly in 60-day systems. Some suppliers recommend reusing coir for up to four production cycles (YARA, 2025). Coir alternatives should therefore be able to support satisfactory strawberry yields upon reuse for at least a second cropping cycle. Major challenges in reuse of growing media include salt accumulation in growing media, potential infestation by pathogenic micro-organisms/pests, and the biological breakdown of growing media altering physical and chemical properties.
The risk of spreading plant pathogens such as Phytophthora cactorum is greater in recirculating systems with multi-production cycles than run to wastes ones (Martínez et al., 2013). A recent article by Hu et al. (2025) reported an increased abundance of secondary pathogenic fungi such as Thelonectria and Chaetothyriaceae, in the root zone of strawberry plants after reuse of peat growing media without steaming. However, actual risk of disease/plant damage is centered on viable micro-organisms which the authors did not assess. A study by Martínez et al. (2013) that employed an analysis of viable micro-organisms in strawberry planted growing media systems found that growing media with composted cork and rice hulls reduced overall fungal populations compared to peat and coir growing media. Growing media incorporating composted materials may therefore offer suppression of pathogenic fungi benefits. A different study by Vandecasteele et al. (2018) on growing media containing various types of composts revealed that severity of powdery mildew infection and aphid infestation was strongly positively correlated with the N status of the crop. This alludes to fertigation management as having a big impact on the risk of disease development in strawberry systems. While pathogenic micro-organisms and pests could be economically dealt with by using chemical sprays or steaming between each production cycle, salt accumulation in growing media presents a greater problem (in economic and environmental terms). High salt accumulation, if it cannot be easily leached, may lead to the spent growing media being unusable for another growth cycle.
A recent study by Woznicki et al. (2023b) employed three growing cycles and reported relatively lower Ca accumulation in wood fiber compared to peat and coir, with fruit yields similar across the production cycles and treatments. This shows good potential for wood fiber incorporated growing media. However, publicly available studies involving multiple production cycle reuse of ‘wood fiber + biochar’ or ‘wood fiber + composted green waste’ growing media are not available for the Irish cropping context. Such information is vital to growers because multiple production cycle reuse of growing media offers significant cost reductions to a farming enterprise.
The objectives of this study were therefore to assess the ability of growing media formulations made from available materials in Ireland (wood fiber, biochar, composted green-waste and barks) to support strawberry vegetative growth and to support satisfactory fruit yield and quality over two production cycles.
2 Materials and methods
2.1 Experimental setup and management
Treatments consisted of three commercial products and eleven formulations using wood fiber, biochar, composted green waste and bark. The composition of the growing media treatments is given in Table 1. Two types of composted green wastes (CGW1 and CGW2) were obtained from 2 different local composting facilities in Ireland to allow observation of potential effects of variability of composted green wastes across facilities. The non-commercial treatments were mixed by hand, with the volume proportions of each component determined by laboratory compacted bulk density (EN13040:2007(E), 2007). None of the growing media mixes were limed/pH corrected nor fertilized initially. This allowed an evaluation of pH buffering and pH changes in the media (as it interacts with a pH 5.5 fertigation solution) and its effects on the agronomic response of strawberries. An industry standard coir-perlite mix (90CO) was used as the experimental control.
Table 1. Growing media formulation and material composition (v/v).
The growth trials were conducted in a heated glasshouse employing a suspended tabletop strawberry production system. The glasshouse minimum temperatures for heating were set at 10°C (day) and 8°C (night), with above glasshouse air vents opening at 16°C. The 14 treatments were arranged in a randomized complete block design with eight and five replicates during the first and second production cycle respectively. Each plot consisted of an 8L trough (top dimensions: 17.3 x 48.4 cm and 16.3 cm height) planted with 6 strawberry plugs to give a planting density of about 12 plants per linear m. (June bearing cv. Malling Centenary). New plants material was used for the second production cycle.
Dosed fertigation was supplied to each plot via two pressure-compensating drippers (6 bar trigger; discharge rate 2 L/h). The fertigation was manually controlled based on the coir media with a target drain of about 20% run to waste. A Dosatron injection system delivered a fertigation solution made from Solufeed™ specialty fertilizers (calcium nitrate, Solufeed Non-Stop mix™, and Solupotasse™). The fertigation solution during vegetative growth supplied (at 1% dilution) the following nutrients mmol/L: 10.69 NO3-N, 1.72 NH4-N, 1.30 P, 5.32 K, 1.27 Mg, 4.50 Ca, 1.15 S, 0.0194 B, 0.0025 Cu, 0.0288 Fe, 0.0146 Mn, 0.00167 Mo and 0.00949 Zn (EC 2080 µS/cm and pH 5.5). The fertigation solution was adjusted using Dosatron settings to have an EC of between 800 – 1000 µS/cm for the first two weeks, then 1500 µS/cm thereafter until the first few flowers appeared. When the plants started flowering the fertigation solution was adjusted to supply the following nutrients (at 1% dilution) mmol/L: 8.744 NO3-N, 1.37 NH4-N, 1.06 P, 6.50 K, 1.0819 Mg, 3.7874 Ca, 0.0157 B, 0.0020 Cu, 0.0235 Fe, 0.0118 Mn, 0.0013 Mo, 0.00795 Zn and 2.06 S (EC 1980 µS/cm and pH 5.5).
2.2 Data collection
2.2.1 Assessment of growing media pH, electrical conductivity, particle distribution, volumetric and gravimetric water content
At the time of potting, all treatments were analyzed for laboratory compacted bulk density (BD), electrical conductivity (EC) and pH. Laboratory compacted bulk density was determined after sieving the fresh growing media through a 25mm aperture sieve into a 1L test container according to the method (EN13040:2007(E), 2007). Bulk density values were converted to dry sample basis after oven drying a different portion of each growing media to a constant mass at 75°C. Analysis of growing media for pH and EC was done after shaking a fresh 60mL equivalent in DI water (1:5 v/v) for one hour (prEN13037:2008.2, 2008; prEN13038:2008.2, 2008). Another portion of the growing media was placed in a cold-room at 4°C until further analysis. A sample from the stored growing media was dried at 75°C to a constant mass then analyzed for particle size distribution using mechanical sieve shaker (Retsch AS200, Germany) equipped with 16-, 8-, 4-, 2-, and 1-mm sieves.
Volumetric moisture content of growing media during the experiments was measured in-situ using a handheld sensor (WET150 Sensor, Delta-T Devices Ltd) placed into the growing media during the strawberry fruit formation and the fruit expansion stages. Measurements were taken at the same time before an irrigation event to capture the dry down (% v/v). Measurement consisted of taking three permittivity (ε) value readings within each trough and averaging the value. The permittivity values were then converted to % volumetric moisture readings using equations obtained after independent calibration curves were determined for each treatment. Calibration was conducted by the incremental addition of a known volume of water to an oven dried 250 mL sample and subsequent measurement of ε. After each production cycle, a representative sample of each treatment was made by removing about 250mL from each treatment trough and mixing it to form a composite sample for analysis of BD, EC, pH and gravimetric water content. Gravimetric water content was determined after drying at 75°C a portion of the sampled growing media to a constant mass.
2.2.2 Assessment of strawberry leaf chlorophyll, berry yields, biomass and nutrient uptake
Leaf chlorophyll concentration was measured using a handheld SPAD-502 meter (Konica Minolta, Japan) at flowering, fruit formation, fruit expansion, and fruit ripening stages. These non-destructive measurements were performed each time on the same three plot replicates selected in the middle rows to avoid border effects for a given treatment and throughout the production cycle. Readings from each trough were averaged from six measurements of randomly selected, recently expanded leaves.
Unblemished strawberry fruits were harvested into plastic trays when fully ripe (> 90% red), then counted and weighed. The fruits were classified as either class 1 when individual fruit mass >10 g or class 2 when individual fresh fruit mass was< 10 g. Ten harvesting events were completed during each production cycle. These harvest events took place over a period of 22 days in July 2023 and 28 days in late May to early June 2024. Runners were periodically removed throughout the growing cycle as required.
Strawberry aboveground biomass was collected after the final fruit harvest by cutting stems from each trough at the growing media level and any runners/diseased or remaining fruit were removed. The stems and leaves biomass were dried to a constant mass in an oven at 75°C, then weighed and ground to< 1 mm for chemical analysis.
A 0.25 g mass of the ground strawberry plant biomass was digested in 10 ml of concentrated nitric acid (69%) using a microwave digester. The digests were allowed cool and then diluted with deionized water to a final volume of 50ml, before being analyzed by an inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrophotometer (ICP-OES; Agilent 5100, USA) for P, Ca, Mg, K, Na, Mn, Zn content at Teagasc Johnstown Castle, Ireland.
Selected nutrient uptake was calculated as Equation 1:
2.3 Statistical analysis
The study employed IBM SPSS Statistics (Version 29.0.1.0 (171)) software for statistical analysis. For each production cycle, fruit yield data and above ground biomass production were assessed for normality and equal variances using the Shapiro-Wilk and Levene tests, respectively. Data on class 1 and total fruit yield (class 1 and 2) was not significantly different (p > 0.05) from a normal distribution and demonstrated equal variances. Mean separation was therefore done using Tukey’s HSD where significant differences were observed. Pooled data for each production cycle for plant nutrient uptake, strawberry growth assessment and growing media characteristics were analyzed for correlation using a Spearman rank correlation test.
3 Results
3.1 Growing media properties
3.1.1 Bulk density, EC, pH and particle size distribution
Except for 20QFC, all the growing media had less than 67% of particles by mass passing through a 1mm sieve (Supplementary Figure 1). The quarry filter-cake component of 20QFC comprised mainly of fine particles and resultantly 89.7% w/w of particles in this treatment were< 1 mm. The 20BC3 and 40BC3 treatments had low (< 20% w/w) content of fine particles (< 1 mm). At the beginning of the first production cycle, the growing media exhibited significantly different (P< 0.001) BD, pH and EC (Table 2). The commercial materials (90CO and 100PT), the bark mixes (50CBK and 50FBK), and 20QFC growing media had pH values that were either at optimum or near-optimum range (pH 5.5 – 6.5) for strawberry root growth. All treatments containing BC2, BC3 as well as 50CGW1 were very alkaline with pH values exceeding 8. The EC of treatments 40BC2, 20BC3, 40BC3, 50CGW1 and 50CGW2 had significantly high EC compared to 90CO. After the first production cycle, the BC1, BC2, and BC3 containing treatments had reduced pH by up to 1.3, 2.4, and 1.6 points respectively. The BC1 treatment, had increased EC after the first production cycle (up to 349 µS/cm more), while BC2 and BC3 containing treatments experienced much less pronounced EC changes. For EC and after the first production cycle, all the growing media except 20QFC was comparable to 90CO.
Table 2. Chemical and physical properties of growing media at beginning and at the end of the first production cycle.
3.1.2 Volumetric water content during production cycles
Volumetric water content in the growing media before an irrigation event differed significantly (P< 0.05) during the fruit formation stages in both production cycles (season 2023 and 2024) and during the fruit expansion stages in the second production cycle (2024) (Figure 1). Volumetric moisture content ranged from 31.5 to 47.9% across the various growing media before an irrigation event in the first production cycle and ranged from 12.4 to 40.0% during the second production cycle. During the first production cycle and at the fruit formation stage, 40BC1 and 20BC1 troughs had the lowest volumetric water content, which was significantly lower than that in 90CO, 100PT, 100RW, 20BC2 and 20QFC. (Figure 1). Compared to 90CO for the same period, 20BC1, 40BC1, and 40BC3 had a 28-34% reduction in volumetric water content, while the rest of the treatments were like 90CO. During the second production cycle and at the fruit formation stage, only the 20BC3 trough had significantly reduced volumetric water content which was 44% less than that in coir (90CO). There were no significant differences in volumetric water content between 90CO and the rest of the treatments during the fruit expansion stage of the second production cycle. At the same stage, the 20BC3 treatment had significantly less volumetric water compared to the 100PT and 20BC2 troughs.
Figure 1. Volumetric water content of growing media measured before an irrigation event. The same letters above bars indicate non-significant differences at α = 0.05. Error bars are standard deviations (n = 3).
3.2 Strawberry leaf chlorophyll content
For both production cycles, chlorophyll content as measured by a SPAD meter was not significantly different (P > 0.05) across all the growing media during the strawberry fruit forming, fruit expansion and fruit ripening stages (Table 3). However, during the flowering stage of the second production cycle, plants in 20QFC exhibited the highest chlorophyll index, which was significantly above that of 90CO, while all the other growing media mixes had plants with similar chlorophyll index to 90CO.
Table 3. Chlorophyll content of strawberry leaves as measured by a SPAD meter during the flowering to fruit ripening stages.
3.3 Strawberry marketable fruit yields and aboveground biomass
Total marketable berry yields per plant ranged between 190 to 221 g/plant during the first production cycle and 194 to 229 g/plant during the second production cycle (Figure 2). For both production cycles, while total marketable berry yields per plant varied by -12.7 – 4.4% for the various growing media compared to coir (90CO), there were no statistical differences (P > 0.05). A similar trend was observed for class 1 and class 2 marketable berry yields per plant between the various growing media for both production cycles. It should be noted that in both production cycles, yields were lower than would typically be expected, even within the commercial growing media blends.
Figure 2. Marketable strawberry fruit yields during the (A) 2023 and (B) 2024 production cycles. Error bars represent standard deviation, n = 8 for 2023 and n = 5 for 2024.
The number of berries per plant followed a trend comparable to that of total marketable yields with no significant differences (P > 0.05) across all the growing media and over the two production cycles (Table 4). However, the average size of berries significantly varied with the type of growing media for both production cycles (Table 4). During 2023, 50CGW2, 20BC3, 40BC3, and 20QFC produced significantly (P = 0.004) smaller berries than the 90CO control. However, during the second production cycle, while the same growing media mixes had numerically less average berry size compared to 90CO, it was not statistically significant. Plant aboveground biomass production was only significantly different between growing media in the second production cycle. At this time, the 20QFC mix produced significantly less above ground biomass compared to 90CO while the rest of the growing media mixes were like 90CO (Table 4).
Table 4. Biomass production, the number of berries and average berry size of strawberries grown in various media.
3.4 Selected nutrient content and uptake in aboveground biomass
Elemental nutrient content in strawberry aboveground biomass varied significantly with type of growing media for P, Ca, Mg, Na, Mn, and Zn content during the first production cycle (2023) and for P, K, Mg, and Mn in the second production cycle (2024) (Supplementary Table 1).
During the first production cycle, plants in the 20QFC growing media exhibited the lowest P uptake and low Ca uptake, both uptakes which were significantly below that of 90CO and 50FBK (Table 5). Notably, plants in the 50FBK growing media had the highest P and Ca uptake of all the growing media mixes, which was however not significantly different to that of 90CO with a numerical change of< 2%. The other growing media mixes were not significantly different to 90CO in terms of plant Ca uptake except for the 40BC3 growing media. During the first production cycle, plants grown in the 40BC3 growing media consistently had significantly less Ca, Mg, Na, Mn and Zn uptake than 90CO. However, during the same period, plants grown in the other biochar types at the same mixing rates (40BC1 and 40BC2) had P, Mg, Na, Mn, and Zn uptake that was above or similar to those grown in 90CO. Plants grown in 20BC2 and 40BC2 exhibited at least 75% higher uptake of Mn than 90CO. All the biochar growing media at 20% mixing rate (20BC1, 20BC2 and 20BC3) performed similarly to 90CO in terms of P, Ca, Na, Mn and Zn uptake in the first production cycle.
Table 5. Uptake of selected elements by strawberry plants in aboveground biomass during the 2023 and 2024 production cycles.
In the second production cycle differences in elemental uptake between various growing media were only significant for P uptake and Mn uptake. Comparable to observations in the first production cycle, plants grown in 20QFC had the lowest P uptake, which was significantly less (P = 0.001) than the P uptake of plants grown in 90CO by 25% (Table 5). Compared to 90CO, plant P uptake was significantly reduced (P = 0.001) only in the 20QFC, 20BC3 and 40BC3 troughs ranging from 18.8 to 24.7% reduction. For Mn uptake in the same production cycle, the growing media 20BC3, 40BC3, 20BC1, 50CGW1, and 50CGW2 had a significant reduction of at least 27% compared to 90CO.
Average berry size and Mn uptake in strawberry plants had a positive correlation to volumetric water content in growing media at fruit formation stage (Figure 3). Growing media pH and EC had a negative correlation to average berry size, Mg uptake and Zinc uptake for both production cycles (except for pH correlation with average berry size in the second production cycle that was not significant). The bulk density of growing media had a significant and negative correlation to average berry size, P uptake, Ca uptake, Mg uptake and Zn uptake for both production cycles.
Figure 3. Correlation between selected growing media properties and strawberry agronomic characteristics during the (A) first production cycle and (B) Second production cycle. *Significant at α< 0.05, **Significant at α< 0.01.
4 Discussion
4.1 Growing media properties
All treatment mixes with biochar and green-wastes had pH values that were initially above the optimum range (pH 5.5 – 6.5 (Rajapakse and Tanaka, 2018)) for strawberry. Treatments made from BC2 and BC3 were more alkaline in contrast to BC1 treatments revealing the differences between the biochars used. Other researchers also reported high pH values of final growing media mixes attributed to high CaCO3 content (Amery et al., 2021a). The extent to which biochar can increase pH (liming value) is related to the ash fraction which is pyrolysis depended (feedstock type, temperature and residence time) (Tumbure et al., 2020). The pH of the 20BC3 and 40BC3 treatments was 8.3 and 9, respectively, which was typical to the pH of 8 to 9 of biochar made from olive stones at temperatures 450–500 °C reported in an extensive review by Lustosa Filho et al. (2024). The growing media was not pH-corrected at the beginning of the experiment to allow an evaluation of pH buffering and pH changes in the media and its effects on the agronomic response of strawberries. The treatments with biochar and composted green waste dropped in pH after the first production cycle suggesting that alkaline ions were either taken up by the plant or leached through the media. However, considering the minimal changes in EC for the BC2 and BC3 treatments, suggests that replacement of the basic cations could be a third factor. Compared to peat, biochar amended media may lead to greater accumulation in growing media of Fe, Mn, Ca, K and P through adsorption (Amery et al., 2021b). The increase in EC after the first production cycle for BC1 and QW treatments, suggests more ion build up in the media than leaching. The reduction in EC after the first production cycle for the CGW treatments indicates significant leaching and or plant uptake. Despite the increase in EC of some treatments after the first production cycle, the EC range for all media remained below 600 µS/cm (Table 2). An EC of less than 1000 µS/cm within the root zone allows for adjustment of the fertigation solution (1200 – 2000 µS/cm) while staying within the EC sum ‘safe’ range for strawberries (≤ 3400 µS/cm – root zone + fertigation solution, Prasad et al. (2022)).
The minimal changes (< 0.1) in pH of 100PT, 50CBK, and 50FBK after the first production cycle, could be because of the high pH buffering capacity. Barks generally have higher pH buffering capacity (for both acid and bases) than peat (Pancerz and Altland, 2020). Buffering capacity is traditionally measured using acid/base titrations and recently an easier and more adapted to growing media method has been proposed (Verhagen and Geuijen, 2024). By using a pH response curve, the amount of either H+ or OH- needed to raise or lower one pH point (meq per pH unit) can be calculated for each growing media component. These calculations are essential for pH adjustment of growing media formulations, taking into account mixing ratios, buffering capacity, target pH and type of pH adjusting material (Verhagen and Geuijen, 2024). When it comes to acidifying amendments for growth media, other researchers have suggested elemental sulfur as better than iron (II) sulfate because while the latter resulted in rapid pH lowering, it was not lasting over a 120 day period (Cacini et al., 2021).
The 20BC3 treatment consistently had lower volumetric water content (36 – 46.5% less) than 40BC3 during the fruit formation and fruit expansion stage of the second production cycle (Figure 1). This was despite the two treatments having a similar particle distribution (Supplementary Figure 1). A likely reason for this could be that the 20BC3 media could have poorer network channels than the 40BC3 media. High diversity of particle size and shapes in growing media has been noted to improve the efficacy of pore channel networks in growing media hydration (Schulker et al., 2021). Differences exist between different materials’ ability to hold water (water holding capacity) as concerning wood fiber, coir, composted green wastes and biochars. For example, wood fiber is reported to store less available water compared to peat (Anlauf et al., 2024), and water holding capacity of biochars can be highly variable depending on their hydrophilic or hydrophobic properties as well as particle size and diversity (Adhikari et al., 2023). Since this study focused on irrigation settings based on coir, further irrigation adaptations would therefore be needed considering water holding capacity of these formulations.
Typically achieving a drainage of 20% v/v in coir media will result in the growing medium having roughly 55 – 65% volumetric water content (close to its water holding capacity) after an irrigation event. The volumetric water content measured in this study is during the dry down between irrigation events. This dry down occurs after drain and is due to plant water uptake (influenced by evapotranspiration, plant growth vigor and stage), and direct evaporation from growing media. Some researchers recommend dry down thresholds of between 15 - 22.5% v/v as optimum for high strawberry yield and resource use efficiency in perlite/bark media (1:1 v/v) and employing sensor based automatic irrigation systems (Hutchinson et al., 2024). However prolonged volumetric water content of ≤ 30% v/v through deficit irrigation could result in yield trade-offs of about 30% as observed in coir (Kouloumprouka Zacharaki et al., 2025). So, while dry down thresholds can be set lower than 30% v/v, constant maintenance of volumetric water content in growing media at this level would not be encouraged.
Hypothetical irrigation adaptations, assuming a water holding capacity of 40% v/v compared to that of coir of 60% v/v, would be to increase irrigation frequency by at least 33%. If a dry down threshold of 20% v/v is employed, irrigation frequency would go up 3 times higher (but with 3 times less volume). Validation of such irrigation adaptation requires growth experiments to be performed.
4.2 Strawberry biomass and berry yields
Total marketable fruit yields were consistent between the 2 growing cycles (190 - 229g/plant). The yields obtained were in the range of reported yields under similar settings in Europe of 200 g/plant (cv. Malling Centenary in coir, Kumar (2021), 249 g/plant (cv. Patty in peat, Altieri et al. (2010), 142 g/plant (cv. Elsanta in coir, Kuisma et al. (2014)), 217g/plant (cv. Elsanta in peat, (Prasad et al., 2022) and 325g/plant (cv. Malling Centenary in coir (Woznicki et al., 2023b)). This is in contrast to yields levels of around 500g/plant (cv. Malling Centenary, in peat) obtained by Aurdal et al. (2022) in Norway and those reported by Kehoe (2021) in Ireland (675g/plant, cv. Malling Centenary). The harvesting period for each production cycle in this study was 30 days, as opposed to 84–90 days of harvest in the studies that reported higher yields (which took advantage of the plant’s ability to exhibit an ever-bearing characteristic). For example, if reported yields by Aurdal et al. (2022) and Woznicki et al. (2023a) were limited to the first four weeks of harvest, the cumulative yields they obtained of 250 and 263 g/plant respectively in coir would be in range of that obtained in this study.
The lack of significant differences in total marketable fruit yields across different growing media obtained in this study is analogous to results reported by Aurdal et al. (2022), where strawberry was grown in coir, peat and wood fiber + compost mixes of up to 75% wood fiber. Fruit yield results from this study indicate that there is good potential of using locally available materials as alternative growing media for strawberry production. However, further studies are required with prolonged harvesting periods that take advantage of the ever-bearing trait condition of Malling centenary variety.
During the first production cycle, while 50CGW2, 20BC3, 40BC3, and 20QFC produced significantly smaller berries than the 90CO control, it was probably due to multiple varying factors/mechanisms within each growing media mix. The high pH (8.3-9) of the 20BC3 and 40BC3 growing media may have led to P immobilization as observed by the reduced P uptake of plants grown therein compared to 90CO. The relatively low water content of the same biochar growing media at the flowering stage is likely to be another key contributing factor. Reduced P uptake would likely occur in the early vegetative stage of the crop, which would be resolved as plant growth progressed alongside the observed pH changes in the growing media. The low berry sizes from 20QFC are likely due to high anion retention properties of the quarry filter-cake that made P less available despite the ideal pH (5.5) as observed by reduced P uptake of strawberries grown therein. The low berry sizes observed for 50CGW2, were likely a result of high salt content (Cl- and Na+) in the growing media as this treatment had the highest initial EC of the growing media tested (650 µS/cm). However, since Na+ and Cl- content in the growing media were not assessed, this represents a limitation of this study.
4.3 Strawberry chlorophyll index and nutrient uptake
The SPAD value has a direct linear relationship to extracted leaf chlorophyll content (Martínez et al., 2017), and is related to strawberry fruit quality (phenolic or anthocyanins content) (López-Fabal and López-López, 2022). Low chlorophyll content in leaves is usually a result of N/Fe/Mg deficiency (Valentinuzzi et al., 2015). Deficiency of Fe and or Mg may result from salt stress, salt imbalance and/or high pH in growing media. Both salt and alkalinity stress (high Na, Cl- and CO32-) on strawberry results in lower chlorophyll content as measured by SPAD chlorophyll index (Yildirim et al., 2009; Malekzadeh Shamsabad et al., 2020). The N/Fe/Mg nutrition and or salt/alkalinity stress might not have been an issue that affected photosynthetic activity across the growing media as observed by the lack of significant differences in the SPAD values between 90CO and the rest of the treatments during the fruit formation, expansion and ripening stages. This result is likely because Mg, Ca, and K supplied to the plant is known to alleviate salt/alkalinity stress (Yildirim et al., 2009). Other studies have reported similar non-significant leaf SPAD index results across growing media for strawberries grown in peat, coir, perlite and tuff growing media (Alsmairat et al., 2018).
The optimum strawberry leaf content of selected nutrients is reported in the range 0.25 -0.6% P, 1.5 – 2.5% K, 0.7 – 2% Ca, 0.5 – 0.5% Mg, 25–200 mg Mn/kg and 20–50 mg Zn/kg (Vandecasteele et al., 2018; Osvalde et al., 2023). These ranges are for leaves collected during the fruit formation stage when nutrient demand is highest. The content of P, Ca, K, Mg, Zn and Mn in strawberry biomass was above the minimum thresholds for deficiency during both production cycles (Supplementary Table 2). It should however be noted that the biomass samples were collected after harvesting fruit when nutrient demand is not at its peak but still sufficient to pick up if there were any nutrient deficiencies. Plant uptake of Mg, N, P, and Fe peaks during vegetative growth stages, while K uptake peaks during flowering and fruit maturation stages (Lieten and Misotten, 1993). The above-ground biomass analyzed in this study generally constitutes about 35% of the total biomass of a strawberry plant, and at least 50% of N, P, and K that the plant takes up would have been removed in the fruit (Tagliavini et al., 2005). Similar-in-range content of P, Ca, K and Mg in glasshouse grown strawberries is reported by Adak and Gubbuk (2015) who used various coir, peat and volcanic tuff growing media mixes and by López-Fabal and López-López (2022) who used peat, gorse (Ulex europaeus) and poultry manure growing media.
The pH and EC of growing media was negatively correlated to average berry size, Mg uptake and Zn uptake, because high pH leads to Zn immobilization in growing media (Silber, 2019) and high EC leads to reduced plant uptake of both Mg and Zn. Reduced plant uptake of Mg and Zn could result in low berry sizes. For example, Zn deficiency is known to reduce fruit set and fruit size of strawberry (Lieten, 1997) and reduced Mg uptake affects photosynthetic ability as Mg is essential for Chlorophyll (Yildirim et al., 2009). However, Mg deficiency would likely have been picked up in SPAD index measurements as a reduction of chlorophyll content in leaves. The lack of differences in SPAD values therefore suggests that Zn uptake had a far greater influence than Mg uptake. The bulk density of growing media had a significant and negative correlation to average berry size, P uptake, Ca uptake, Mg uptake and Zn uptake for both production cycles. This makes sense because higher bulk density physically restricts root growth, which then limits plant nutrient uptake as the rhizospheric area is reduced.
Nutrient adaptation of formulated alternative media could be done by producers of growing media; in such a case slow-release fertilizers would be most suitable. These slow-release fertilizers allow the nutrients to be available for a longer period, avoiding immobilization within growing media during storage and transport. Similarly, growers would require applying nutrients for maintenance, however, using different fertilizers which are immediately plant-available to keep optimum levels of nutrients for plant growth.
4.4 Limitations of research and future research directions
The major limitation in the current study was lack of irrigation optimization of the various growing media. It should be noted that optimum irrigation has not been established for these new formulations, and this study provides the first baseline using methods developed for coir/peat. Determining optimum irrigation schedules for the various formulations is a necessary next step. Optimization of irrigation and fertilization presents major standalone experiments where irrigation frequency and duration could be varied at multiple levels. Such a study would be possible through smaller pot setups as opposed to semi-commercial trials employed in our study.
Another limitation of the study is the limited variability of composted green waste tested. While the tested composted green wastes were from two of the largest suppliers in Ireland, this only represents roughly 5% of total composting facilities. Composted green wastes are known to vary in properties and chemical attributes due to variability in feedstock affecting seasonal batch lines. As a starting point, this current study shows that there are differences in properties and agronomic potential of composted green wastes from different suppliers. Further studies employing composted green waste from multiple facilities/suppliers are therefore recommended.
Pre-processing of the growing media materials/formulations should be explored, for example practicality of leaching of or exchange of cations in materials like composted green wastes and biochars to reduce EC, pH, and balance nutrients. Future research should include longer cropping cycles with ever-bearer varieties, multiple production cycles with early monitoring of agronomic responses during the vegetative stages (leaf sampling and analysis, SPAD measurements). An analysis of disease and pest incidence/prevalence when novel formulations are employed is also required. Assessment of fruit quality and fertigation optimization for the potential growing media is recommended.
5 Conclusions
The tested growing media formulations supported strawberry growth and yields similarly to coir, and over two production cycles. The tested formulations have good potential as alternative media and minor adaptations are required. These adaptations include pH and irrigation strategy adaptations to get comparable to coir results. The observed consistency of berry yields between two production cycles implies that some of the treatments tested maybe reused for a second cycle without yield reductions. However, challenges in harboring plant pests/pathogens when growing media is reused should be assessed as well. With further research on optimization, wood fiber-based formulations with biochar or composted bark could reduce the 35,555 m3 coir growing media requirement for the strawberry industry.
Data availability statement
The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/Supplementary Material. Further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author.
Author contributions
AT: Conceptualization, Writing – review & editing, Investigation, Methodology, Visualization, Formal analysis, Writing – original draft, Data curation. EC: Writing – review & editing, Validation, Methodology, Investigation. MG: Validation, Methodology, Supervision, Writing – review & editing, Project administration, Funding acquisition, Conceptualization.
Funding
The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research and/or publication of this article. This work is a product of the Beyond Peat project that is funded by the Irish Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine (DAFM), grant number 2021R499.
Acknowledgments
We express gratitude to Teagasc staff who assisted with maintaining the glasshouse work, sample collection and laboratory analysis. Special thanks go to Shane Brett, Leo Finn, Anthony Gargan, Wendy Pierce, and Linda Moloney Finn.
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
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Supplementary material
The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fhort.2025.1655481/full#supplementary-material
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Keywords: biochar, coir, compost, fruit yield, nutrient uptake, re-use, soilless, substrates
Citation: Tumbure A, Corbett E and Gaffney MT (2025) Alternative wood fiber, biochar, and composted green waste growing media formulations for glasshouse strawberry (Fragaria X ananassa) production over two production cycles. Front. Hortic. 4:1655481. doi: 10.3389/fhort.2025.1655481
Received: 27 June 2025; Accepted: 01 September 2025;
Published: 19 September 2025.
Edited by:
Chris Blok, Wageningen University and Research, NetherlandsReviewed by:
Dimitrios Savvas, Agricultural University of Athens, GreeceErik Van Os, Erik hydroponics, Netherlands
Copyright © 2025 Tumbure, Corbett and Gaffney. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
*Correspondence: Akinson Tumbure, YWtpbnNvbi50dW1idXJlQHRlYWdhc2MuaWU=