Need Fertilizer for Dummies Instruction

[Blondie]

I have had to face the sad fact that I really don't understand fertilization. Can you help? I need you to be as layperson as you can with your responses...

1. What brand of fertilizer should I use when a plant is resting? What kind for flowering? Just saying 30-10-10 freaks me out. When I get overwhelmed by not understanding technical jargon, my first instinct is to crawl into bed and pass out from fear.

2. What are the exact steps for fertilizing? Such as 1.) fill pail with a gallon of water... I don't have a gallon of water each time I've attempted fertilizing, so I usually just "guess" at the ratio and then dump in the fert water. Do I rinse with clean water after? Leave only fert water in? Now of course you are starting to get the picture about how little I know about fertilizing. As for basic watering, I hold the babies under the tap and flush it through for a while until it looks good and wet. If I have to set down the pot in the sink to do the fert solution, will this hurt the plant? Is the germy sink bad for the plant? And if I do this with more than one plant, will they "infect" each other or bother each other in any such way if their bottoms sit on the same "toilet"?

3. Does "weekly weakly" mean to NOT follow the instrux of ratio to water on the package?

4. Does one orchid need that whole gallon mix or can you split it up between all the orchids? How much does each orchid need?

5. If I'm not thinking of a question, feel free to give extra information.

My plants: Brassia Eternal Wind, phal NOID, phal brother sara gold, 5 minis (which I never seem to water enough, so they'll probably all be dead soon), including a ghost orchid but I can't remember the other technical names right now...



Thank you,

The Bad Fert Girl

[ilurk]

i'm fairly noob, and i'll tell you what works for me.

Go to home depot, buy something that says "orchid fertilizer" (some of the other kinds have some cheap piss-nitrogen aka urea which require soil bacteria to break down, they also tend to lack trace minerals), make sure it's the one that dissolves in water, ask one of those unhelpful guys if you need to. A higher middle number 10-20-10 for instance means it's better for flowering.

Get a leftover milk gallon jug or even a quart. follow the instructions on the label. They'll probably give you two instructions, one for half-dose. You don't have to fertilize at every watering, i hardly ever fertilize at all and my orchids seem quite happy about it, happy enough to send out sticky sappy spikes. pour your fertilizer-solution on your plants instead of regular water, that's it, it's better to under-fertilize than over-fertilize. don't need to run water through it. You might want to run water through it a few watering's later to flush out the mineral buildup, but the way you water, it's like flushing it anyway.

[Jeremy]

I would stop giving fertilizer when resting, and use 10-30-20 for flowering (first number for growth, second for flowers, third for roots). Everyone has different methods for fertilizing, so for me, I first add 1/4 teaspoon of fertilizer in a 1 gallon watering tank and fill it with lukewarm water. Then after it is filled up I mix the solution with a spoon. Then I place a plant in the sink, and water the medium by pouring water from the spout of the watering can. Once the roots of the orchid are green (which means they absorbed the fertilizer solution) I take another watering can filled with clean lukewarm water and shower the leaves. Don't shower with the fertilizer solution since it leaves ugly salt marks on the leaves. After showering I place the plant back and do the next plant. Placing a plant in the same sink is fine as long as you water it separately and individually basically one plant at a time. For my measuring I use a spoon that came with the fertilizer, and if you need to use half a gallon use half of the 1/4 teaspoon etc. Weakly weekly means that once a week use only 1/4th of the strength of fertilizer that they recommend on the label and use that strength weekly. You can split one gallon with other orchid (seems ridiculous to use one gallon for a 2.5 in pot mini), and give the orchids enough water to completely soak the entire pot thoroughly and the to make visible roots are green. I recommend you mix the solution just as your about to use it. Well I tried to answer every question; I hope this info helps. Good luck

[luckygrower]

I agree with Jeremy on many of his points, I too used a gallon milk jug to mix my fertilizer until I found a 1 gallon watering can at my local nursery, I have 5 different fertilizer ratios that I use for differnt plants at different times of the year, there are many ideas as how to and when to fertilize, you just need to find what works best for the orchids you have.

[Blondie]

OK, I'm starting to feel a little better about this. I will keep working on figuring out a system that works for my collection. Thank you!

[Ray]

Blondie,

There are a lot of misconceptions about feeding out there, so don't feel alone. There are a few basics that can be helpful.

• As was mentioned, a plant that is "resting" needs little-to-no applied nutrition at all.
• Too much nitrogen, compared to the other nutrients (as in your 30-10-10 example), may lead to extra vegetative growth, but can delay or stop flowering altogether.
• Plants need all three macronutrients, plus a whole bunch of minor- and trace elements, to be healthy and grow and bloom well.
• A high phosphorus fertilizer is NOT a bloom booster. Plants actually need very little P, and the rest is wasted.
• Feeding a low dosage of fertilizer regularly is better than larger, infrequent dosages.

Personally, I prefer to use a good, complete, orchid fertilizer at 125 ppm N at every watering (divide 10 by the %N on the label to get the appropriate teaspoons per gallon) for my extremely varied collection.

If you want to learn more, I have assembled some good info at my website. Check out the "Feeding" section here: First Rays' Free Info