Are products like espoma and eb stone immediately available?

[Lebniis]

If I'm mixing in All Purpose Plant Food from E.b. Stone into the top few inches of soil and watering it in. Am I using the product correctly? This is outdoors. Are the nutrients readily available upon application or is there some process before the plants can take it up?

Thanks for your help

 

[Scrappy4]

The nice thing about a top dress is you get a little at each watering. A nice and easy way to fee, works well. How much is available depends on the fertilizers solubility. If you want fast you could bubble it in a tea to break down the pellets faster, want faster yet? Dilute the tea and use as a foliar feeding.......scrappy

 

[BurnOne]

The bone meal isn't readily available. I don't think the feather meal is either. I'd mix it thoroughly into your soil mix.
Burn1

 

[Sat X RB]

another issue that will effect nutrient uptake is the 'newness' of yr garden.

if you've put soil newly together it takes a while for the bacteria, organisms, etc that work together with soil minerals ... to organise themselves and breed up to an effective level. when this has been achieved yr mineral uptake will increase.

 

[Lebniis]

Sat X RB, I think you pretty much hit the nail on the head with my garden. It has been thrown together quickly. What would help me most given my soil situation? Adding mycorrhiza?

 

[Lebniis]

Soil is 10% perlite, 90% local organic top soil. It isn't as aerated as I'd like.

 

[ixnay007]

Myc won't help much, since it needs to be mixed into the roots of your plants, I'd say things like ACT tea or EWC tea would be your best bet, add as much microflora as possible to get them working on making things available.

 

[jerry111165]

It totally depends on the individual item. Dry fertilizer mixes are constructed with a variety of organic ammendments. Some may dissolve quickly, while others, like bat guanos or greensand can and will literally take 10 years to fully break down.

In order for any organic ammendment to break down, bacteria is needed. Without the bacteria it would just sit there forever.

Scrappys suggestion of topdressing is a good one but next time mix the dry ferts directly into your soil mix.

After you topdress your best bet is to make sure that your microbe population is where it needs to be and you can ensure this by applying several ACT's, whether it be a full brewed ACT or simply vigorously shaking up earthworm castings and water and drenching your soil. Do this several times.

Another good idea, After you topdress with the dry ferts and apply your ACT's will be to then topdress with more EWC's, compost, vermicompost or both. These items are where all of your soil life comes from and is the heart of a successful organic garden.

Best of luck - remember, microbes first, food second. It doesn't take a lot of food but it does take a lot of microbes to make for a healthy garden.

Jerry.

 

[BurnOne]

^^^ Bat guano breaks down quickly. Topdressing with bone meal won't do any good. It must be thoroughly mixed with the soil to work.
Burn1

 

[OrganicOzarks]

Get some soluble myc's, and feed with compost tea, and you will be good.

 

[SeaMaiden]

Jerry got it, except that I would expand the beneficial microbes beyond bacteria, there are many others and types.

Someone posted a list of approximate 'activation/availability' times, and IIRC bone meal and most other meals are around a month. I use bone meal extensively, most recent example are my Camellia and rhododendron, both of which have responded beautifully with blooms and vigorous new growth.

If you're after a longer-lasting source of P, you can use soft rock phosphate.

Either way, you need microbes to really get any of this done. A whole suite, an army.

 

[Lebniis]

Damnit guys, now I have to read more about teas, my knowledge I really lacking. I'm sure this is answered in the Tea Article, but what is easiest to add to make Tea? Are their any premade bags that can be dropped in and bubbled, maybe just add source of carbohydrates and go? Really short on time so like everything and everyone trying to be efficient. Thanks for all your responses!

 

[jerry111165]

It really depends on what kind of tea you'd like to make and what you're wanting to gain by using them. More often than not, we want to feed the microbes and not so much the plant. There are a wide variety of teas, from Aerated Compost Teas (ACT's) which are used to raise and maintain microbial soil life levels, Syrups, which are concentrate forms of plant extracts made from the "dynamic accumulator" family of plants - think comfrey, borage, and many more. Properly made, and with minimal effort they will store for several months.

Then we could move onto another type of tea, again made from accumulator plants which contain a variety of nutrition, elements and different characteristic, Fermented Plant Extracts, or FPE's. When you get a chance, do a search on them - pretty interesting.
The easiest by far, and probably the most beneficial for you in your "I need it right now" situation will be a simple Botanical Tea. Pick something that contains the elements you're looking for. To find out which plant contains what elements, Google "Dynamic Accumulator Weeds". This will take you to a chart of handy plants and list the elements they contain. If I get thw chance I will post the link shortly. Anyhow, take Kelp Meal, Alfalfa Meal, Dandelions, Borage, Yarrow, Nettle, etc. - take a 1/8 to 1/4 cup of plant material (dried) and put it in a gallon jug almost full of water. Shake vigorously and let it sit with the cap barely cracked (it will build up gas) for 2-3 days to 2 months. Use at will. This will give you the benefits that each accumulator plant contains in a super easy tea.

Best of luck -

Jerry

 

[SeaMaiden]

Think of it this way--you can make a tea out of almost anything. I personally avoid using guano because of the possibility of diseases (I mean, if you can get something from the fresh bat shit, who's to say it's not possible from that which has been collected and packaged?). I can tell you that guano teas also smell like gack, as do blood and bone meal teas.

Alfalfa tea, takes an hour or two, and mine is just a handful of alfalfa hay (I get the sweepings from the feed store for free instead of buying a bale of hay) gets tossed into a gallon of warm water to steep for an hour (or if I'm treating a lot of plants, then I make it a concentrated tea then dilute) and is then either fed via root drench or foliared. Triacontanol+N are the goodies you can hope for from that.

Dr. Earth makes pre-mixed fertilizers that you can also make into teas, very simple and easy to do.

There's just a whole slew of possibilities once you get started. I still haven't done a 'proper' aerated compost tea due to two problems--my compost pile doesn't grow fast enough to really compost and I haven't dropped the dough for a large air pump.

Jerry, I just learned something more from you, thanks!

 

[jerry111165]

Sea Maiden, you're very welcome of course.

Once you discover the incredible benefits of the "Dynamic Accumulator" family of plants you'll simply never really need anything else to make teas from.

Here is the link that will help to show which benefits come from which plants -

http://oregonbd.org/Class/accum.htm

The alfalfa tea that you're using is fantastic. Try mixing it with Kelp Meal for even further added benefits. If I had to choose 2 plants to use in teas it would be kelp meal and alfalfa meal, hands down. Kelp meal give not only a wide array of elemental nutrition but also contains "growth regulators", which will keep internodal spacing very close, ie: tighter fatter flowers - less "stretching".

Can't forget Comfrey, either. Magical, wonderful plant.

Jerry.

 

[Microbeman]

The only thing I caution with the lonterm botanical concoctions is if they go alcoholic. This is not good for your plants.

On the soluble mycorrhizal spores, this is a scam. There is no such thing. How can a spore be soluble?

I have yet to see solid evidence concerning the efficacy of foliar feeding of teas.

On mixing organic fertilizers into the soil be cautious on what the ingredients are so to avoid a nutrient lock up or overload.

Fungi is a major player at degrading topdressed matter/nutrients which are made availabe to bacteria/archaea which are eaten by protozoa which release nutrients available to roots of plants. This is what compost tea is all about because you are growing bacteria/archaea, protozoa and fungi.

 

[Microbeman]

Sea Maiden, you're very welcome of course.

Once you discover the incredible benefits of the "Dynamic Accumulator" family of plants you'll simply never really need anything else to make teas from.

Here is the link that will help to show which benefits come from which plants -

http://oregonbd.org/Class/accum.htm

The alfalfa tea that you're using is fantastic. Try mixing it with Kelp Meal for even further added benefits. If I had to choose 2 plants to use in teas it would be kelp meal and alfalfa meal, hands down. Kelp meal give not only a wide array of elemental nutrition but also contains "growth regulators", which will keep internodal spacing very close, ie: tighter fatter flowers - less "stretching".

Can't forget Comfrey, either. Magical, wonderful plant.

Jerry.

Jerry; Do you know the foundation for that chart for evaluation of accuracy? The info on the sight concerning microbes is not entirely accurate so that makes me wonder.

 

[heady blunts]

if your mix is 90% native soil you probably (/hopefully) have lots of beneficial indigenous microorganisms.

 

[jerry111165]

MM, I compared some time ago against a similar chart and both were close, at least, but no, I haven't done the actual chemistry on them myself.

I do use botanicals faithfully in my no-till with fine results. Is it the botanicals? Is it the ACT's? I can't say for sure but that's all I use so either way between the 2 they're working well.

Then again, it could be the Miracle-Grow...hehe

Jerry

 

[hope2toke]

I'd buy the floor sweepings, then again I don't collect my own! I have the alfalfa and other forage seed, I think the sowing time is fall though....