Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: Stratts on June 08, 2012, 13:36
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Hi guys,
Does anyone know of a simple chart, table, etc, that tells you what plant likes what food/fertiliser, etc?
It's something I don't have the hang of yet knowing what to use where.
Something like
Cabbage = Chicken pellets
Toms = Tomorite
Cucumbers = The samaritans!! :D
If not can you post on here and I'll make one up ;)
Cheers
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Best thing I can say is take a pen and paper and stroll round the shelves of the garden centre reading the front, and more exactly the rear of all those cardboard boxes of chemicals.
This will tell you what chemical to use to remedy which (or any) problems you see on your plants foliage.
The garden centres would love you to buy a box of spud food, a box of cabbage food, a box of swede food and a box of carrot food, etc, etc, when they may all be needing a dose of the same box! Cheers, Tony.
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I'm sure everyone has their particular favourites but I manage with only 3 general types:
"Balanced" general fertiliser: this includes Growmore, Pelleted chicken poo, FBB. For all practical purposes they are interchangeable, although Growmore is the quickest acting, PCM slightly higher in Nitrogen, and FBB more slow-acting.
Tomato fertiliser: useful for all flowering crops grown for their "fruits."
Liquid feed: I sometimes use Miracle Grow, but only for a quick fix if plants seem to need a boost - it's a bit high in nitrogen so is really only ideal for leafy crops.
Good general soil condition is more important than trying to buy exactly the right fertiliser for a given crop, so I agree with Klefti's sentiments!
Weather also plays a part - with 3 days each with an inch of rain in less than a week I expect my sandy soil to be pretty much leached of some of its nutrients (especially nitrogen) which will need replacing - heavier soils will no doubt fare better.
(As for cukes, I'll bear that in mind, but in my view they don't really want to be helped and would rather head straight for the undertakers! :nowink:)
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Its the NPK values ( on the back of all packets ) of fertiliser's that indicates what its good for.
N P K
Nirogen Phosporus Potassium
Potash
Leafy Growth Roots Flowers & Fruit
Chicken
Pellets 4 2.5 2.5
Blood
Fish & 6 6 6
Bone
Growmore 7 7 7
Q4 5.3 7.5 10
Etc
All plants need some of all the elements but for example Tom's need more K to produce well, cabbage need more N.
Nitrogen is lost from the soil quicker than the others thats why a lot of people use chicken pellets.
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Echoing Jay on the whole
blood fish & bone for everything
chicken pellets for anything leafy
potash (ash from woodburning stove usually) for fruit
with manure or home compost added to beds for potatoes, squashes & sweetcorn, peas & beans, lime on brassica beds
sulphur chips on blueberries to try to keep soil acid
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Sunny - do you just chuck that wood ash on the ground around the plants? I have a woodburning stove but I usually just put the ash in the compost bins. And what other sources do you use for potash?
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do you just chuck that wood ash on the ground around the plants?
That's what we do.
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Thanks guys that's really helpful stuff again :D
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Does anyone make up a chicken pellet 'tea' to dilute with water as a feed?
If so could it be diluted with water and applied around the base of leafy stuff, like the brassicas, to get down to the roots better than scattering the pellets on the deck?
And would it be a good thing to use on the spuds?
Ta