AusBonsai

I normally fertilize my bonsai with a weekly fertilizer each weekend. alternating between seasol and charlycarp/compact(from bonsai south nursery).
But when i water it in i see a lot of water running out the bottom of the pots and i wonder how much of the fertilizer is actually left in the pot to be used, and how much just ran out the holes.
I put osmacote in my potting mix, but that breaks down over 9 months so i dont know if that gives much per week for 36 weeks.

So what i an looking for is something i can put on or in my pots each weekend that will break down over a week or so and slowly fertilize during the week. Something low maintance as i tend to just have time to water my plants in the mornings before i take off for work.

Dose anybody have any suggestions?

I use Neutrog "Sudden Impact"
It is a chook poo based one that seems to working OK for all my trees

There was a thread the lat couple of days here about chook poo ferts too

Ken

Hi Rowdy
Seasol and charlie carp are just tonics and not atcual fertilisers. The good thing about them is that you can't overload trees like you can with DL or similar products. It depends what you have - do you have any natives that are phosphate sensitve ? You can give figs and bougys large doses of DL or similar without ill effect but not trees like lilly pilly, banksia etc. Pup recommends a soluable fert like Yates Thrive Flower and Fruit which has low phosphate (The P in the NPK analysis) for natives and you can use it on everything else too.


Tony

I have figs, elms, serrisa, juniper, clerodendrum, and boug, and i will pinch some wisteria cuttings from the tree down the road when it stops flowering. none of them are developed, all need a lot of growing. I new seasol wasnt a fert, but i thought charliecarp was. No wonder not a lot is happening.

I have seasol and powerfeed (which is a fert) but not sure about charlie carp. Look on the bottle and see if it has an NPK analysis. And let me know. I only woul not be sure about the clero with some ferts - figs will take whatever you can give them. What side of the river are you from ? I have just found everything has started to power on in the last couple of weeks - swampies are starting to wake up and firethorns are putting new shoots out everywhere.

I use Charlie carp as a fert.
Seasol every other week as a Tonic

Another way to try and make the most out of the ferts and nutrients you use, is to add a microporous substance such as zeolite and/or perlite to your general mix.
The fine lattice like structure of these materials allows them to adsorb water, ammonium (N) and potassium (K), releasing them slowly over time at the plants demand. Makes me feel a bit better about pouring expensive liquids around anyway. They aid in drainage too, which is an added bonus.
Zeolite is relatively easy to source and perlite is even easier, should be around $25 for 100L of perlite and around $20 for a 25kg bag of zeolite (last time I bought it).
Cheers

hi mate,

you could get some fert baskets that go ontop of the soil surface, alternatively you could put it in an old stocking and lay it on the soil, same diff. that way your trees will be getting some food everyday, even if it is only a little bit that the trees get each day it can be quite useful. slow release in the soil is good to, it will break down that little bit every day over the 9 months.

all of the species you keep will be fine with dynamic lifter, the clero take it up just as quick as the figs if not quicker I fertilise every 5-7 days with my grow on trees, a couple of days later some seasol, use DL on the soil, slow release in the soil, and a trace elements every 6 months or so. doing it this way my trees have never been healthier, but! it took me a long time to work out what was best and what was performing. liquid ferts although not measure would be somewhere around reccomended. if you use the rule of fertilise a little but more often is a pretty good way. learn your trees and they will tell you what they need, always build up your fert regime not just go bang with a high dilution rate (heavy) and heaps of DL etc. build it up over a course of a few weeks, that way your trees wont sulk on you and in the end they will be stronger and have the ability to take up that bit more.

jamie

I visited the Big green place today and i didnt really find anything thats a short term, use up in a week thing.
I got a couple of things to try though
Tablet spikes "bloom boost" which are NPK 8.8.12 these last two months
and something called rose starter which is 2.3.5
it dosnt really have a lenght of time its lasts so ill just see how long it lasts visually

hi mate

I dont know why I didnt think of this earlier but you could make your own fertiliser cakes that you can mix up to suit 1 week replacement, I would at least try and get a couple of months out of them though, having that on as a slow release never hurts. heres a link to a thread on here about which also has a link to a cake recipe. ofcourse you can change it up to suit what you have and how long you want them to last.

viewtopic.php?f=12&t=1714&p=16450&hilit ... kes#p16450

jamie