Calcium chloride commercially used to dry things in humid environment Commercial known as drierite. Usually the dry material is blue and by heating in oven when white it is regenerated. You can have it in the same container as seed in a sealed water proof glass or plastic container for storage.
Calcium carbide (CaC2) waste can be used for storing rice seeds meant for planting under room temperature. However, contact with moisture must be avoided as the waste easily produces calcium hydroxide [Ca(OH)2] or slaked lime on hydration, which is an important liming material.
The calcium carbide waste I recommended for rice storage is abundant in mechanic villages of most developing world who use carbide plants for welding and body work of automobiles. They are indiscriminately discarded as waste and have been potential sources of lime for acidic tropical soils. In Nigeria they are free for all as many have not discovered the enormous benefits.
Hi Florence,
Maybe you could try activated charcoal as desiccant. We are using drierite as our desiccant. With charcoal, you don't know if it needs to be reactivated unlike drierite which changes color. You could also try storing your seeds hermitically in airtight glass jars or other storage medium once you have lowered the moisture content of your seeds.
Anhydrous sulfates like calcium, magnesium and sodium are common alternative desiccants to silica gel because of their high affinity with water. Magnesium and calcium sulfates have high capacity (number of water molecules absorbed per gram of drying agent) complete drying (equilibrium favors the hydrated form) and rapid drying process.
The only let down for these drying agents is the ability to tell whether or not the crystals are already hydrated because its not self indicating unlike silica gel. But in general, if you see that the crystals are still finely scattered it means that it is relatively dry but when it forms larger clumps of crystals it means that it already absorbed large quantity of water and replacement should be done as soon as possible.
To store large quantity of rice seeds, dried rice straw may be used. This is traditionally followed by farmers to store seeds for the next season.
hello friends, thanks a lot for your suggestions. I'll try mixing the drying agents you suggested with indicating silica gel. that way, will be cutting down on cost. again, I am grateful
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