Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum
Bulbs => Ian Young's Bulb Log - Feedback Forum => Topic started by: blagoves on February 19, 2008, 05:09:23 AM
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Hello Ian,
While at your weekly bulbs log, a few times I came across the potash feeding in the middle of growing season of the bulbous plants. What is your take on feeding with Nitrogen just after the new growth begins to give a boost to vegetation stage? Or the bone meal applied in fall should suffice?
Most of my bulbs have already poked their heads through the ground.
There are so many organic products out there and it is really tempting to apply something like blood meal, cottonseed meal etc.
Thanks for the input,
Anastasia
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Hello Anastasia, sorry for the delay in replying but I am still trying to catch up after my month away.
I do not add any extra nitrogen as there is sufficient in the bone meal. If you think your bulbs are struggling to put on leaf growth and look like they are suffering from a lack of nitrogen then you could apply a light dose.
In my experience bulbs do not need heavy doses of nitrogen and if they get them they become very leafy and soft and this increases their vulnerability to fungal and bacterial attack.
Potassium is what they need plenty of to store away for next year.
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Ever tried potassium on Pleione Ian ??? ???
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Luc, we haven't fed potassium to Pleiones.... they're not "real" bulbs, after all!
When we did try feeding Pleiones, in the distant past, we used Osmocot fertiliser and got HUGE pseudobulbs and no flowers ....went back to leaving them be.... until the pleoine bug wiped them out a couple of years ago... they did well untill then, though. We only gave thenm a little liquid feed in those years...... can only suppose that, as a storage organ, a little potassium to give them some starch to grow on might be helpful.... someone will either have to try it out or tell us what happened if they already did try it!!
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Thank you very much, Ian. This is what I thought.
BTW, I am very jealous of your recent trip and the pics look gorgeous too! ::)
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Thanks for filling me in Ian - I normally only feed them tomato fertilizer myself but I may do a careful test and see what happens.
Where your Pleione whiped out by Brevipalpus Ian ?
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Where your Pleione wiped out by Brevipalpus Ian ?
YES! :'( :'( >:( :( :'(
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Luc, I do pot my Pleiones with Osmacote in their compost, but I use the high potassium formulation, with trace elements, 9 months. They're not fed otherwise. The pseudobulbs grow to a good size, though not "huge" as Ian suggests and I get a great many flowers.
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Ian - I really enjoy your bulb blog, thanks.
I am trying to find out which potassium sulphate to use as you suggest. There are many types available here. The one that most resembles yours physically (the grade of table salt or slightly finer) is 100% water soluble and the analysis is 0-0-50. Now that means it has little residual effect, is one application per year sufficient if this is the one? Is this the one? Another has coarse granules that is slow release, same analysis. As well of course there is muriate of potash which I avoid. Are any of these the same as the one you use? The cost is about 18GP/25kg & the price is due to go up by 50% shortly.
Would this be safe to use at this time of year on all bulbs including cyclamen and some southern hemisphere bulbs (I avoid potassium on the latter as a rule. Am I correc or is it just New Zealanders?).
I have quite a collection Nerine hybrids from the Smithers. From what I read and from his notes all fertilizer is to be avoided. In fact I struggled to come up with a nutrient poor mix - peat-sand 50/50, that's it. In the last 10+ years I may have given them a half dozen applications of 1/8 to 1/16 strength water soluble fertilizer. They bloom well but this year the leaves are smaller than usual. Am I being too cautious?
thanks
johnw
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John there are no New Zealand bulbs at all so your non-fertilizing regime doesn't apply to those. :) I'm interested that you don't fertilize nerines though as some of mine are not flowering well - they're not yet in need of clump division - and I was about to give them some sulphate of potash. I bought some a few days ago and it seems to be a powder, not sugary or salt-like. It is 0-0-42-18, N-P-K-S.
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Leslie - I didn't realize there were no NZ bulbs! I was referring to things like Proteas and Puyas and other southern hemisphere plants which we were told hate potash & potassium. Have you found this to be the case?
My Nerines have been repotted about 3 or 4 times. All seedlings of each hand-pollinated cross from Smithers are in one pot. All are now in 6" deep pots and the pots are bulging and ready to explode. I have far too many pots and can hardly afford the space even larger pots would require. There are some wonderful colours ranging from smokey purples to whites, clear reds, salmon oranges, oranges, pinks...the whole gamut, much as you see in his book "Adventures of A Gardener". They are a real joy at a barren time - October until the new year. I put a label around the neck of each bulb and record the colour each year along with a flower per stem count. It is quite amazing to see the different colours a single bulb will exhibit over the years making it very difficult to discard what ones thinks of as a dog.
The one time I did fertilize them a bit more than of late I got some basal plate damage though they recovered. Peter Smithers says in his book "Soil need not be rich and all fertiliser is dangerous, encouraging basal rot and virus." It will be interesting to hear what others have to say about mixes and fertilizing.
johnw
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John
I have no experience regarding the South African bulbs except for the Nerines we have in the garden - they do get sulphate of potash on occasions.
The soluble potash you mention sounds fine, the one I use is not fully soluble that is why I sprinkle it on the surface. I do apply a second dose in the years when the bulbs grow on for a long time. Last year for instance we had a very hot spell in April which caused most of the bulbs to start to go dormant so they only received one extra feed. In other cooler years I have to withhold water in June to force them to go dormant so that I can repot them - then they got two feeds.
I would think that as your potash is 100% soluble a dilute liquid feed could only be a benefit to your potted nerines and other South African Bulbs. We are always reading about how much better they flower after a big fire -the fire releases potassium as well as removing the competition leading to the mass flowering.
Caution is required with chemical fertilisers as too heavy a hand could led to burning of the roots but I have never had any problems with mature bulbs. I did experiment with newly germinated seedlings and they can be damaged it is best to wait until they are at least two months old before applying a diluted dose.
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I feed my Nerine sarniensis at this time of year with SoP dissolved in water. I have also moved them outside now
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Ian & Mark - Thanks so much!
johnw
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I was referring to things like Proteas and Puyas and other southern hemisphere plants which we were told hate potash & potassium. Have you found this to be the case?
John I don't grow proteas, leucodendrons and the like but I do grow some Australian trees and shrubs, acacias, eucalypts etc and those are also supposed not to like chemical fertilizers of any kind. Certainly mine don't get any but that's more a matter of laziness/lack of time than a positive decision to refrain. I grow some small nerine species such as filifolia and about 30 different hybrids of small stature which appeal to me more than the larger kinds. These too, I've not fertilized though I was planning to give them a little potash this year. Now I'm not so sure, following Mr Smithers' advice. Not every one flowers each year. I'll post a few pictures when they are in flower, the buds just coming through now. In general, they are exactly like the larger hybrids with a great colour range, but everything smaller in proportion. As an example, one is the same scarlet orange with that lovely glistening quality, as N. sarniensis but the stem is less than 30cms high, and very fine (though sturdy) while the flower head is about 6cms across. My N. sarniensis are just about finished now.
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I wish you could see Don Schofield's Australian hybrids. They are outstanding, in every possible shade of pinks, oranges, reds, purples and white, with picotees, silver and gold dusting etc. I don't know the Smithers Nerines, where do they come from? but it seems that people in several parts of the world are achieving perhaps similar results with new forms and colour breaks.
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I don't know the Smithers Nerines
Sir Peter Smithers: http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2006/jun/15/guardianobituaries.obituaries
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Some Vico Nerines here http://www.nerines.com/ (http://www.nerines.com/)
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Thanks Rob. I had heard of that Smithers but hadn't connected him with Nerines. Mark I think you put this link up some months ago? I remember thinking then that they were Faaaaaaabulous, as Anna Russell would have said.
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Yes I did. The web site has changed. Back then he had all his colours on seperate pages but he now only has the named Nerines. They are unbelievable. I'll have to save a few pennies for his sales list this August
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Mark - Thanks for that super link on nerines.
And Leslie - I love to see some of your dwarves.
If I recall without consulting the book, Smithers took over the Exbury collection years ago and continued the hybridization to lofty heights. A few years before he died he gave his collection back to them and they continue on.
I was fortunate as we had been corresponding and wrote to him one time about the results of some op seed he had sent. The timing was impeccable as he had just collected his last hp seed and decided he couldn't cope with it. So he sent the lot to me. I wasn't quite prepared to grow so many - 19 crosses in all. Many had sprouted in the envelope so they got planted. I haven't had much luck photographing them as that sparkling surface is very hard to capture. I don't think anyone has matched Smithers' photography using Zone VI field camera or his impeccable long-term record keeping for that matter.
johnw - hideous weather here, -6c at the moment.
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I've just had a good look at the Nerine site. They seem to concur that nitrogen is to be avoided. Puzzling is their recommendation of bulb fibre in the potting mix. Can anyone tell me what is meant by that?
There certainly are some spectacular oranges on the site.
johnw
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Maybe for the added humus? Bulb fibre usually contains some charcoal, so it would help to keep the potting mix 'sweet'??
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David - But what is bulb fibre? A mix containing coir? We in North America are often puzzled by some of the UK ingredients, in cooking as well!
johnw
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John, it is a mix of sedge peat to retain moisture, with added nutrients, together with some oyster shell and charcoal. It is marketed for use with potted bulbs that are intended to be forced indoors, and those grown in pots without drainage holes. I don't use it all I much prefer my variation on our beloved Bulb Despot's potting mix! ;D
Believe it or not, we don't use it for cooking either :P
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Hi Ian:
I can add to the effect of potassium to South Africans and South Americans, of which we grow many hundreds of species. We have used it for every known genus with extraordinary results for some 30 years now. Including Nerines of course, both winter and summer growers.
Since we do not repot, the plants receive some three foliar feeding with a complete formula during the season to cover their possible nitrogen defficiency.
The element that has been found hard to handle for African bulbs (and plants like Proteas, etc.), is phosphorous that seem to act as a poison even in minute doses when added to the mix.
As for Puyas, South Americans, they come from a region when mineral content is high in the soils and do not seem to resent high alkaline salts.
As for Sir P. Smithers comment on "fertilizer" I have often wondered if it was no tused in the American sense of the word, that is manure. For on the contrary, Nerines fed on high potassium and low nitrogen are healthy, robust, pest free, and flower their hearts out.
Potassium sulphate is available here as
"commercial" Potassium sulphate, crumbly, a creamy white, obviously containing impurities, or
"pure for analysis", the laboratory product, very expensive, like snow white salt.
Needless to explain, we use the first presentation, that has the added minerals that "stain" the product. Each 5 gallon container is given a pinch sprinkling once a month during the season of growth to be leached down by waterings of rain.
Regards
Alberto
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Well that sounds pretty definitive Alberto. So if Nerines are happy with high potassium and nil phosphorus, I'll apply my new lot probably as soon as the flowers are finished, a small sprinkling then watered in, and maybe a little more in the spring.
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I promised some pictures of my dwarf nerines, and I'm putting them on the "April 2008 in the Southern Hemisphere" thread.
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I'm putting them on the "April 2008 in the Southern Hemisphere" thread.
Excellent, Lesley, thanks... I'm off for a look!