By Staff
I've had this love of gardening (of growing something, anything) since I was a very young child. It started with a few classes in 4-H.
Down through the years, I've learned this about gardening: Every garden is not the same. What works great in my garden may be different in yours.
And those tags that come with each plant, what you read on them may be true, but, then again, you can't always believe all that you read.
If it says shade, the plant may need more sun. If it says moist soil, it may like it drier, and vice versa.
In gardening, it's all about the trials and errors and a lot of them.
Nature can be and often is very cruel, to our human way of thinking!
In our gardens we want to see what what will work best for us.
Experiment a little.
I read two articles in two separate gardening magazines.
Each had a different outlook on fertilizing. This is only a pinch of what I read.
I could break down fertilizing into column after column.
For instance, did you know that feeding the soil is more important than feeding your plants?
We want to feed and provide a food source for good soil microbe and micro-organisms, beneficial bacteria and fungal activity, such as mycorrhizal fungi (I could write a whole column on this alone) and the part they play in making nutrients more available to our plants.
And let us not forget the workhorses of the garden, the earthworm.
In foliar feeding, it's all about spraying or applying liquid nutrients (fertilizers) to the plant through the foliage or leaves.
On each leaf there are small pores called stomatas. Every plant has stomatas on each leaf and on both sides of each leaf.
Most plants have more on the underside of their leaves.
These pores or stomatas carry the gases and liquids into the plant's internal system, deep into the stems and every part of the plant.
This article proclaimed all the advantages of foliar feeding, which it said was numerous (lush, healthy growth, more vibrant colors, earlier, larger, more plentiful blooms, huge, tastier harvests and all-around stronger, healthier plants).
Foliar-applied fertilizers are three to five times more effective than root feeding and successfully fulfill the nutritional needs of plants.
When sprayed on the foliage the nutrients pass very quickly into the plant's pores and affect the plant's vital functions and processes.
When using liquid fertilizers, always read and follow label instructions for proper dilution and application.
The best times to spray are early morning or early evening, when it's not too sunny and hot.
The liquids will be absorbed more quickly and this, for Pete's sake, won't burn the foliage (Oh! the gardening stories I could tell about my spraying on scalding summer days. Hard lessons learned on this one, I can tell you. Oh well, live, learn and garden.)
Psst! Here's my secret. I use the Miracle Gro no-mix hose-end sprayer bottle attachment.
What results I get! I know, I know, I want to use more organic fertilizers and make the switch from chemical synthetics to the organic types.
It also said that commercial growers have been using foliar feeding successfully on their crops for many years.
I'm getting a bit long-winded on this article.
Maybe I should continue on next week's column about root feeding, if you don't mind.
Real gardeners know that every day brings new challenges.
Possibly it's the trials, errors, successes and accomplishments that we gardeners find so fulfilling and this makes gardening so rewarding.