Flower Plans Spring 2018 Who else is in..

[FourOaks]

Originally Posted by Cole_Robbie

You probably got that marigold suggestion from me. I hope you do well with them. Leaf miners liked to chew on mine. I think all zinnias are susceptible to powdery mildew. I learned not to leave wet plants in the back of the truck overnight. I'm not using Sevin dust any more, because washing it off is a pain.

I like Osmocote. I have also used the much cheaper Schultz pelleted time release fertilizer, and it seems to do fine as well.

The hardest challenge for me is to plant each week what I will sell in one saturday, about 6-8 weeks down the road, which means a little bit of everything. I tend to go overboard and plant too much of one thing at one time.

You absolutely deserve credit, in regards to the Marigolds! I have grown the standard Marigolds, but the Strawberry Blond will be something new.

I understand fully about the planting conundrum. I have a notebook full of notes, when and what to plant. Its a task, keeping track of veggie plants for production, for sales, and then pile on the flowers. Then, taking into account field growing, and Greenhouse/High Tunnel growing. DTM.... it can be a bit much.

Last year I just kept taking my stuff to the Market. Saturday after Saturday. I eventually got rid of most of it. The way I see it, if you dont take it, you cant sell it. Seeds are cheap, and I have no reservations about sterilizing the soil and plastic, if need be. Ill get my moneys worth out of them.

Originally Posted by clkeiper

Yes to the slow release. I mix in osmocote and I also fertilize with an injector when I water. I do petunias, begonias, a few hanging tomatoes, fuchsias, combination hanging baskets... whatever I can get for materials whether by rooted cuttings or by seed. I started begonias in December. they are about the size of my fingernail right now. they take a long time.

So you both recommend Osmocote. I assume just the regular, not the plus?

And that brings up this - im certainly no expert, but I thought in general flowering plants prefer a fertilizer with more phosphorous? There seems to be a heavy debate on this. Unlike vegetable plant studies, I havent been able to find any papers on the topic. Nothing credible anyways.

clkeiper, you specificly mention your use of an injector in addition to the slo-release. Is there a point at which you just use clean water? Im sure it takes several waterings to get the slo-release to start dissolving, and I can understand using a liquid fertilizer in the beginning until the slo-release takes over.

Im not trying to over complicate, just wanting to clarify.