Garden Girls Favorite Fertilizers
I’ve come to learn that gardens need just a few things: plenty sun and water, and to be fed on a schedule. For years, I would fertilize my garden, and then forget to do it for months thinking that would be fine. But then I’d get frustrated when nothing would really grow or my fruits would be tiny. When I realized that it’s ok, even necessary, to fertilize weekly to every other week, my garden took off! I also had to start writing my fertilizing schedule on the calendar, otherwise I’d forget and never do it.
There are many fertilizers out there and it can be hard to know what to use and when. We like to stick with an organic brand that’s made right here in Houston: Microlife! They’re organic, local, and have everything we need. It’s a win-win. Read on for which ones we use and how we use them.
Feeding your garden
When we install or refresh a garden, we love to add the following amendments:
We’ll shake out a good helping of Microlife 6-2-4 pellets all over the bed as well as blood meal and work those into the top couple inches of soil. The 6-2-4 pellets are a slow release fertilizer that will provide all the Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium (NPK) that new plants need, plus add beneficial microorganisms and fungi into the soil. These microorganisms help roots resist mold, fungus, and other diseases that can kill a new plant. It’s a good idea to add these 6-2-4 pellets once a quarter as they begin to break down and dissolve. That way your soil will always have the good stuff it needs to be healthy.
Blood meal can be found as a powder or granular size and is a slow-release, big shot of nitrogen to help roots get going and leaves to stay green and healthy. Add this once in the Spring and once in the Fall as you refresh and prepare your garden for the new season.
Once transplants and seeds are planted, we like to add Microlife Ocean Harvest. It’s a liquid fertilizer with an NPK of 4-2-3 with all kinds of good stuff like fish and seaweed emulsion that helps give new plants a good boost into life. You’ll want to use this every week to every other week at the beginning of a plants life.
After things have been growing for awhile and you’re starting to see blooms and fruits, we like to switch to Microlife Max Blooms. This is a liquid fertilizer with an NPK of 3-8-3. It has a higher middle, or Phosphorus, number because growing roots, fruits, and blooms need more phosphorus to really thrive. When you want more blooms and more tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplants, etc, you’ll want to use Max Blooms every 1-2 weeks during the production cycle.
You can also amend the soil with bone meal as a slow release, high phosphorus fertilizer. Add this once in the Spring and once in the Fall as you refresh and prepare your garden for the new season.
That’s it! Those are the only things we use to keep our gardens thriving all year round. All these can be found at Buchanan’s Native Plants in Houston, Berings, or at Ace Hardware. The Microlife website also has a list of their retail stores.
