Organic Gardening will upgrade its login and registration system on
December 11. The new system is needed to support some of the major site
enhancements that we are currently developing. The new system is shared with
other Rodale sites, including Prevention, Men's Health, Runner's World and Women's Health.
Click here for answers to the most frequently
asked questions related to the new system.
I've been using high nitrogen seabird guano, compost, and alfalfa pellets in my aerated teas. My tomatoes absolutely love it. There aren't many flowers yet, but they're a healthy shade of green. I'm guessing this means they need more phosphorus..
If I brew a high phosphorus bat guano tea, do I need to add more nitrogen for the bacteria?
Be careful when using too much high nitrogen materials on tomatoes. You'll get lots of tall leggy plants with few flowers and fruit!
Have you put any bone meal under your tomato plants? This is the best way to get more available phosphorus to your plant roots for extra flowering and fruiting.
Another thing you can do is, use more corn meal, or grain meals, and less animal manures in your teas. This will give you more phosphorus and potassium, and less nitrogen, per tea brew.
I feed my tomatoes a diluted aerated tea 2-3 times a week. I use more fresh seaweed and Epsom salt in my teas to get more micronutrients than nitrogen to my plants' foliage and roots.
Yeah, I put bone meal under the plants before I put them into the ground. By the looks of them, it wasn't enough...I guess the powdered bone meal broke down faster than I assumed. Live and learn.
About the tea....I was wondering about microbial activity with different NPK ratios. Does anyone have information concerning this?
I've had great success with high nitrogen mixes, but will I get the same microbial activity with a high phosphorus mix?
The real truth is that your aerobic microbes will fiqure it out for you, and keep in all straight, when it comes to the uptake of all the soluble nutrients to your plants. All you got to do is feed the microbes and breed them like crazy real fast everywhere in your garden!
The goal is to put all the compost, mulches, and other organic matter you can get in your soil all year round. Then use a special aerobic tea to enhance your compost and soil microbes, to work faster and harder, to get more available nutrients into your plants.
Some nutrients like NPK, better released to plants through a soil drench working with soil amendments.
Micronutrients and extra nitrogen, are released faster into plants through foliar feeding.
If you use your teas for both foliar/soil drenching at the same time, plus composting and mulching, you will maximize microbial action and growth, and maximize nutrients availiabilty to your plants.
