Biodynamic v Organics, Comparative Trial set up

In a personal communication, Prof. John Reganold suggested that for a comparative trial between organic and Biodynamic to be scientific you need four blocks that are 50% organic and 50% Biodynamic. All management practices such as cover crop selections, seeding rates, ploughing times, use of sulfur and copper-based sprays (eg Bordeaux mixture) are identical except that one plot gets the Biodynamic preparations and one does not. This means more work, at least until the system is up and running. It will mean, for instance, making two composts that are identical, but one has the Biodynamic compost preparations in and the other does not. The Biodynamic half of the vine block gets all nine Biodynamic preparations–the three field spray preparations Horn Manure 500, Horn Silica 501 and Equisetum arvense 508 plus the six compost preparations 502-507, while the other “organic by default” gets no spray preparations and no compost preparations.”