Wow - you're going WAY back. ;o)

1) None of the other recipes supported the 3:1:1 - it was a typo & I think I cleared that up somewhere in the first thread.

2) I encountered lots of weed problems, even with small quantities of manure, and I discovered a number of products on the market that deliver the minor elements reliably and in appropriate ratios, so there was no sense in including even small amounts of manure.
N - nitrogen
P - phosphorous
K - potassium (whooda thunk it - right?) ;o)
Ca - calcium (back on track now)
Mg - magnesium
S - sulfur
Fe - iron (another hard one)
Mn - manganese
Cu - copper
B - boron
Z - zinc
There are a few more, but they are needed in such small quantities that they are almost never deficient
3) Read labels. If your fertilizer doesn't contain N,P,K,S,Fe,Mn,B,Cu, and Z, you should probably include a micronutrient supplement. Most soluble fertilizers contain NPK,Fe,Mn,Z - some Cu, too. Container soils should be limed with dolomite to provide the Ca and Mg (and raise pH), or have gypsum added to provide Ca and Epsom salts used to provide the Mg and S. I don't mind if you pick this part of the post apart and ask questions about what you don't understand.

If you contact me off forum, I'll arrange for you to get a suitable source of the minor elements. If you'd rather order online - you can try Home Harvest (or your favorite source) for 'Earth Juice Microblast' as a source for the minors. Alternately, you could just order foliage-Pro 9-3-6 fertilizer, which has ALL the macros, secondary macros, and micros in one formula. It's as close to a perfect all-purpose mix as I can imagine, I also doubt that you would have any micronutrient issues if you lime and use either MG 24-8-16 or 12-4-8. If you did, it would likely be S, because bark and peat are very low in S. You could solve that issue by adding a little agricultural S (easy to find) to your soil when you make it.

You might also be fine if the CRF you intend to use (Osmocote?) has the minors in it. I can help you cover all the bases if you tell me what you intend to use and what is in it, or how far you're willing to go to cover the bases, but just ordering the Foliage-Pro 9-3-6 instead of using the MG is by far the easiest. If you're sure you'll be diligent about fertilizing, I'd even suggest you skip the CRF (Osmocote).

Easy instructions:
Make the 5:1:1 mix according to the current recipe.
Make it moist.
Put plants in it.
Fertilize occasionally with FP 9-3-6
Water when needed, but not too much.
Don't let it dry out.
Come back and tell us how you did. ;o)

Al

OH! The first post in soil threads I, II and III all said 3-1-1 (with minor differences), and then IV suddenly said 5-1-1 and I kept reading IV thinking I'd see the reason there for the change. Typo never even entered my mind. Duh. Went back and re-read the first thread and there was your correction about 2/3 of the way thru.

Thank you, Thank you, for both the information and the element-intial primer. You are truly a gentleman and a scholar! I won't trouble you further off-line unless necessary and will see about ordering the Foliage-Pro, I'm all for easy! And I'll certainly be back with a veggie/container report.

Your patience is greatly appreciated.

i've been reading these threads and haven't seen anyone mention wood ash- which i have a lot of. can i use this instead of lime in al's mix? this will be my first year of containers with home-made "soil". my garden soil- very sandy- seemed to do ok with peppers last year. so now i have great expectations! thanks for all the wonderful info.

That is a very interesting question, Honeybunchy. I suppose it could be used, but when working with wood ash there is a term known as lime equivalency. In other words, how many 'units' of ash need to be used to equal 1 'unit' of lime?

Unfortunately this is something that has to be tested for, there isn't any reliable way of knowing what the stuff from the fireplace or fire pit contains.

Another *potential* concern would be heavy metal pollution. Plants are able to take up heavy metals, generally in very tiny amounts, but when the material is burned, those metals are left behind. Commercial ash products are tested to ensure concentrations are below regulatory thresholds.

Still, it is a very good question and lately I have seen at least a couple folks having difficulty finding agricultural/dolomite lime. I had thought the stuff was ubiquitous at garden centers/hardware stores, but I guess not everywhere.

Wood ash does raise pH. You generally need about twice as much ash as lime (by weight) - a considerable volume of very fine material in a container. Wood ash is also very high in soluble salts, which will raise the EC and TDS levels of the soil enough that you would need to be more cautious than usual about fertilizer application rates.

I would use it sparingly on the lawn or in the garden and forgo it in containers unless you cannot find dolomitic (garden) lime.

Al

thanks guys, i didn't know about the metals. guess i'll spread it around, off to the side and on the lilacs