hey... want to my local home store(lowels) to get some things and wanted to get some osmocote and the container said it was for acid loving plants question #1 is this the stuff my fellow brug lovers have been useing or did I look at the wrong stuff????????????Question 2 Due brugs like acidly???????
dazed and confussed
2 questions
Irish
At the green house supply place, there are a dozen different kinds of Osmocote. It's possible you got one specially for acid loving plants. Most plants will do fine with acid fertilizer every now and then (unless they specifically need the higher pH of non acid fert. like lavender and babys breath)
Thanks Calalily I didn't buy it for I was unsure and thats all they had there will have to try the other home store to see if they have it
Pete
Irish, they just started selling 10 pounds of osmocote at home depot up here. think it was 18.00 or so for 10 pounds??i found out recently that fertilizer for citrus trees has minors in it, i plan on kind of pricing it out as the citrus fertilizer has minors, too, which is one thing i like. you know how the brugs like iron, i bought osmocote from the nursery near me with the minors in it. it releases apparently according to temps, lasting longer in winter. plain osmocote is probably fine, but i started buying the osmocote with minors from that nursery last year and this year i bought a 50 pound bag for 75.00. i am not together enough to put peters on everything every week, i use the peters bloom booster a couple of times during the year. i think brugcrazy said she uses something like that when she first plants to get the roots going. is rambling part of the brugs addiction? hope i made some sense, irish.
Arlene: I use Osmocote when I plant all my brugs. Unfortunately I pay $7.99 for a jar that isn't even a lb. probably a half pound. I have never seen large bags of it. There is a home depot about 2 hours south of here. I'd better check it out. Then in the summer I fertilize with 10-60-10 weekly when they are flowering. In the winter in the greenhouse I foliar feed them bi weekly and mix it with End All. So far I have been very lucky, no bugs to speak of. When I get aphids I will buy a couple thousand lady bugs, and encarsia formosa for white fly and special spider mite predators for them. I am keeping the greenhouse quite humid and have had no spider mite yet.
Irish
Since they like iron, the acid osmocote will be fine. Iron makes it easier for them to take up calcium. That should be in the acid formula.(iron) Thanks Arlene, I wasn't sure. I use mum special w/minors on my brugs. We get it in 50lb bags for about a dollar a pound. I did notice Home Depot had the 10lb bags, much cheaper than the little tubes.
i emailed osmocote last summer, they told me you can only buy it with minors from a nursery/gardening center which is what i did. a seed/feed that sells large bags of osmocote without minors did tell me you can buy minors separate. brugs sure are hungry!
Thanks again I use a lot of ironite I buy a 10lb bag and just toss it over the beds I don't get a lot of yellow leaves at all.I fertlize bi weekly with mirco grow at twice the strenght and fish stuff. Arleme what is the type of osmocote you are buying???and I am not sure what minnors is sounds like it may be iron please let me if I am thinking right.
Pete
http://www.amleo.com/help-desk/item.php?159123
Irish, there's a link, i am not saying it is any better, i just have rotten soil, have been using this now for 2 years. link should show you the minors in it.
actually, got behind in fertilizer, didn't know if i should put out osmocote in the fall, realized brugs had quit blooming so i put out bloom bosster the easy way, spread it around and turned on the sprinklers...getting buds inbetween seed pods.
What the heck are minors???
Minors are listed after the major nutrients of Nitrogen, Potassium and Phosphorus (NPK i.e.6-10-10 etc.)the minors are usually listed in this order Calcium, magnesium, iron, boron, copper, manganese, molybdate,zinc and must be listed on the package and what percent the fertilizer contains.
I should have added that Iron is usually listed as ferrous sulfate and/or ferric sodium EDTA and boron is usually listed as sodium borate.
This message was edited Wednesday, Nov 21st 9:03 PM
Thanks Cala,you always come up with the right answers. I thought they might be some kind of bugs, LOL
thanks Arlene and Calalily. This will help alot will try to fine some and see how it works for me. with this sandy soil that I have I think the time release will work better thanks again.
Pete
Hey Cala...not too far off topic here (after all, this is the Brug forum) but was wondering if a good dose of some sort of iron would help my gardenias. They are acid loving plants, and tend to get a few yellow leaves here and there. (These are potted plants.) I sometimes top-dress them w/cottonseed meal and also water them with a vinegar/water solution, both to keep them in an acidic medium. Perhaps all they need is iron tho, eh? Any ideas for a quick iron fix?
Horseshoe. Mine kept dieing until I started using ironite realy made a difference in them. the liquid will help right away now I use the the day stuff it takes a little longer to work in
What a great Thanksgiving, our local flock of wild turkeys is out front, 7 now, only 3 a few years ago.
was gonna tell you irish, time release is good. Cala knows much more than me. i am just too lazy to fertilize anything every week.
arlene
Arlene are you having turkey for dinner today? Maybe they're trying to make you feel guilty!
Horseshoe
Yes, the iron is a "quick fix" for deficiencies. I hope I explain this right...the iron makes it easier for the plants to take up calcium, which is what they need. It won't help add more calcium if they can't use it, that is what the iron does. Some plants need the lower pH to make the calcium available to their root system. Iron is good for all acid loving plants (don't EVER use it on marigolds, they get a toxicity from it and will die). Petunias, Million bells, bacopa, gardenias, hydrangeas anything that gets yellow leaves from incorrect pH will benefit from the iron.
Calalily so now I know why all my Marigolds are dieing thanks a bunch.
Pete
Thanks folks...I'll get some ironite tomorrow (I imagine everything is closed today). Yes, Cala, that is how I remember the interactions of the elements. Thanks!
Okay, ya'll have a Happy Thanksgiving! Pig out for me!!!
H.