I'm new at container gardening and am finding my flowers are not growing very fast, are leggy, are dying away and have very few blooms. Not sure what kind of fertilizer to use. I've been using fish emulsion. Anyone recommend anything else that's organic? I'm also wondering if I'm watering too much. Is that possible? Thanks.
organic feritlizing
Overwatering can definitely make things look wilty, not bloom, and then die off, so I would definitely check to make sure you're not watering too much. Anytime you think you ought to be watering, try sticking your finger a couple inches down into the soil and see if it still feels wet, if it does then don't water, wait until the top couple inches dries out. The amount of water needed also depends on the type of plants you're growing, some like more water than others. Another possibility on the legginess is that they're not getting enough light (this could explain lack of blooms too but most likely they wouldn't die from this, just look a little less happy). If you have plants that want to be in full sun and you've got them on a patio or something that's shaded for most of the day, they're going to get leggy trying to stretch for the sunlight. As far as fertilizers, you can buy fertilizer with bone meal in it which has phosphorus, that's the nutrient that tends to boost bloom production but I think you have another problem there either with water or light or both which is more important to fix than the fertilizer.
Fish emulsion is really only recommended for foliage type plants. Try "Plant tone", it's 5-3-3. What are you growing in the containers?
Tommy - I'd be interested in how/where you found the information that brought you to your conclusion. Could you please expand?
Al
Same here--I use fish emulsion on all sorts of plants and never saw any problems. I'm not a big fan of foliage plants so pretty much everything I grow has flowers.
Thanks for all your comments. These containers are on the south side in almost full sun in a very hot area. They get really wilty by afternoon and if I don't water twice a day, start dying away. Which is the mineral that promotes blooming? Is it phosphorous? Isn't nitrogen for green growth?
You're right, it's phosphorous for blooming and nitrogen for green growth. However, it sounds like your plants are really stressed so I don't think fertilizing them with anything is the right thing to do. Being in full blazing sun in a hot climate can be really stressful for plants in containers, can you move them to an area where they get some shade at least during the hottest part of the day?
And for watering, how are you watering them? Are you just watering them quickly, or is it a deep watering? One thing that often happens is if you let the potting mix dry out too much once, it is very hard to rewet, so from then on when you water, if you're just watering a little bit, the water tends to not really soak into the soil, instead most of it just runs out the bottom of the pot. A little water will get in the soil, enough that the plants might stop wilting so you think you gave them what they need, but in reality you barely gave them anything. What you need to do is give them a really good soaking, you can do this with the hose/watering can by watering how you normally would, let it soak in, then come back and do it again, and keep going until you can tell that the potting mix is really wet all the way through rather than just around the edges. When you water thoroughly like this, your plants will perk up a lot and you will probably find you don't need to water as often. We had a few days of 100 degree temperatures a couple weeks ago, and with my plants that were in 4 inch pots I had to water some of them every day and some were OK with every other day, and anything larger than a 4" pot was fine with every few days all the way up to once a week for the larger containers.
Tapla and ecrane3,
I'm not saying it's a problem, it's just that fish emulsion is typically 5-1-1 which is high in NITROGEN. This is typically recommended for foliage type plants. For BLOOMING plants a higher 2nd number is recommended. Bloom boosters have a higher 2nd number for instance.
A nitrogen number of 5 isn't really very high, you're not going to be in any danger of over-stimulating green growth like you are with some of the synthetic fertilizers. If your plant needs a bloom booster though you're right, adding something with more phosphorus would be helpful.
Tommy - Fish emulsions are typically 5-1-1, 4-1-1, 2-3-1, 3-1.5-2, 0-10-10, or other formulations to suit a wide variety of growing situations for those that prefer an organic source of nutrients. I've used all but the 3-1.5-2. I questioned your comment because it is a blanket statement & probably a little misleading - even with further qualification/explanation.
Gardenmermaid - If your plants are "dying away" it could be too much or too little water or too much fertilizer. High root temperature are also a suspect in this case. I would worry first about getting the plants to a condition where their foliage is healthy & only then concern myself with stimulating bloom production by manipulating P levels. You probably don't even need additional P in a highly organic soil to achieve satisfactory bloom production if the important cultural preferences of your plants are met. I know you prefer an organic fertilizer supplement, but all purpose miracle grow 24-8-12 is a very good choice for most container plants, and it's fast acting - unlike fish or seaweed emulsions that depend on micro-organism activity to break down the fertilizer into usable elemental form for plant uptake.
Incidentally, the numbers on a fertilizer package are more important in how they relate to each other than how high they are individually. 24-8-12 MG contains the same ratio of NPK as 3-1-2 or 15-5-10. You would just use more of the fertilizers with lower numbers (by weight) to reach the recommended concentration. 10-10-10, 12-12-12, and 20-20-20 all contain the same % of NPK in that blend, but the 20-20-20 is twice as concentrated as the 10-10-10, so we use twice as much 10-10-10 to achieve the same concentration as when using the 20-20-20. We can't really say that there's no danger of overstimulating (let's say "burning") just because we choose a supplement with a low % of N in it. It still depends entirely on how concentrated we mix the solution.
Al
Boy, you all are giving me great suggestions. This fertilizing business has been confusing and am now starting to get a handle on it. I agree about the watering that it has to be really deep and thorough. Trying that now. They are starting to come back and I see some blooms forming. Yeah! I also have some compost tea. Anyone have experience with that?