modified 5-1-1 mix for acid loving plant (Miracle Fruit)
alexander3_gw
12 years ago
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redshirtcat
12 years agoroachslayer
12 years agoRelated Discussions
modified Al's Gritty Mix and 5.1.1 mix
Comments (12)Around here the pine bark mix at Home Depot that works is the #302 Golden Trophy bags. I've been using this for the last 4 or 5 years. The only problem is that the #302 bags vary significantly from pallet to pallet. You need to check an open bag and make sure. If the chunks are small then the entire pallet is probably OK. If not the bags in the entire pallet is not usable. I got burned this year in my first buy and had to unload all the bags to someone's in ground garden (after a harsh winter I wasn't thinking straight :-). The bags were wet and the chunks seemed small after a quick inspection but after getting them home they stunk (which I heard was not good) and had a lot of sticks and bigger chunks hidden in them. A week later I went to a different Home Depot and found a pallet of perfect #302 pine bark and loaded up as many bags that will fit into the van. A couple of years ago the good pallet of #302 was behind a bad pallet which required me to climb over the bad pallet to get to the good pallet. The employees at Home Depot must have thought I was nuts. Last year I found #302 Golden Trophy at Menards with the same pallet to pallet differences but this year Menards doesn't seem to carry it....See More5-1-1 or gritty mix for epi's and dragon fruit?
Comments (8)Thanks for the firsthand accounts with epi's. I feel pretty good about the gritty mix for them. I hope mine become as happy as yours. :) I have the bark and the granite for the gritty mix; just need the Turface now. There is a John Deere Landscaping store about a mile from my house. Will be dropping by there tomorrow to see if they have Turface in stock. If not, the NAPA down the street has 8822. I'm a little vague about the gypsum. I have FP already. So do I need the gypsum if I'm using FP from the beginning, or can I just skip it? On another note, (isn't there always another note?) I rescued a rhapsalis cruciforme today from Lowe's and it's looking a bit sad. It's currently growing in what I can only describe as soggy dirt and though I have not yet pulled it out to look at the roots, I suspect there is rot going on there. The mix is wet, but the stems appear somewhat dehydrated nonetheless. My guess is the staff at Lowe's have been dumping water in it every day. Should I bare root the poor thing right now and pot it into gritty mix or should I just let it dry out and stabilize a bit first? The poor thing seems a bit stressed out at the moment and I'm not sure it can take a severe trauma. On the plus side, there are at least 50 stems in the pot and I talked the staff into giving it to me for $5. When I got it home, I gave a short tug to each stem and, amazingly, none of them came out. I'm pretty sure it's salvageable at this point, but it really needs to come out of the dirt it's in. Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks. Peggy...See More5:1:1 Mix for Acid-Loving Plants
Comments (11)You'll drive yourself crazzy trying to maintain any particular media pH. If you want to manage pH, manage the pH of your irrigation water, which is much more important than media pH, & forget the medium. You can use pH paper to measure pH and lower your irrigation water to any pH you think is favorable with white vinegar or citric acid. Actually, there are a number of acids (nitric, sulfuric, phosphoric, ...) that would work, but how they mesh with your fertilizer supplementation program would vary according to what you are using for fertilizer. I honestly don't worry much about pH. I grow lots of pines, junipers, azaleas, and other plants that prefer an acidic soil with no attention to pH other than being reasonable about how I choose my Ca source, and the pH of my irrigation water is always north of 8.5. About the only time I notice any issues is in the later part of winter on my indoor plants. I start to see some yellowing because I don't water as copiously indoors as out. This allows the Ca/Mg to build up in the soil & pH to climb a little. I'll often see some chlorosis that proves to be a pH induced Fe deficiency. All I need do to correct, is add a couple of tbsp of vinegar to each gallon of my fertigation solution (I fertilize every time I water in winter). If the bloom booster fertilizer you plan on using has more P than either N or K, I would skip it. There are no plants that use more P than either N or K, and the extra P tends to inhibit uptake of N, Fe, Mn, other micro-nutrients, and unnecessarily raises pH. You can use gypsum as your Ca source. It looks like a better choice based on the Mg content of the fertilizer you listed, but the Ca/Mg content/ratio of the other fertilizer could have an impact on the best choice. Al...See MorePilea peperomioides ( sharing success with 5-1-1-1 ) mix.
Comments (16)The Pilea Peperomioides (Chinese Money Plant) is the plant I've been wanting! I've looked everywhere (as you all know its really low inventory - most people start their own with a clipping from a friend's). Might anyone find it in their hearts to possibly cut off a little offshoot and mail it to me in NY state (USA)? I promise I would then grow it and pay it forward (or back) ! Please consider. I'm at xanda.martins@gmail.com...See Morecalistoga_al ca 15 usda 9
12 years agoroachslayer
12 years agoalexander3_gw
12 years agoroachslayer
12 years agoykerzner
12 years ago
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tapla (mid-Michigan, USDA z5b-6a)