Hi, Sissy. There are some variables that come into play, like temperature in particular, but you can use both types of fertilizer at the same time as long as you use reasonable care, ". . . all things in moderation". For example, you wouldn't want to use the maximum suggested dose of a CRF and then turn around & use the maximum dosage of a soluble or liquid nutrient blend also - especially during warm periods when the CRF tends to release more nutrients. I usually incorporate about half the recommended amount of CRF to act as a soil 'charge' (a real term), and then depend on frequent weak doses (remember weakly weekly) of liquid or soluble blends at frequent intervals. Certainly you can fertilize every day/every time you water if you want to. If your soil drains well enough to flush it regularly, there will be no harm in using a 1/8-1/4 strength solution at every watering. Whether you change anything when your plants go outside depends on what you're doing now. I can say that your plants will want and use more fertilizer, and that they will tolerate much higher levels of fertilizer in the soil than they did when they were under the low light conditions and resting indoors. The rains shouldn't be leaching any more nutrients from the soil than your watering practices. If you make it your goal to use a soil that allows you to water copiously enough that 10-15% of the water you apply exits the drain hole each time you water, you can make your plant nurturing efforts much simpler & closer to worry free. There are lots of opportunities for further discussion in this thread topic, based on the directions it could go, so please don't hesitate to continue if you have additional questions. Al

Yes. THANK GOODNESS IS RIGHT JODI! I was just at HD lastnight when I noticed all knds of bulbs, seeds, and many spring items coming in! Guess what I saw surrounding all the seeds and bulbs like the great wall of China? Big bags of Miracle Grow...lol Yup. Somebody is making tons of money on that stuff. Not from me anyway. By the way, I also saw tons of houseplants, mostly all of them left for dead! All were so dehydrated, including the beautiful Hoya's they had just gotten two weeks ago. The mix in those pots was peat based and hard as a rock! They were also infested with mites! My goodness, I will never take a plant home from them this time of year. We are happy you are watching yourself and not pushing anymore huge piles in wheel barrows. Lets's bring in the warm temps. Suppose to be in the 50's by next weeks end and finally, just maybe I can finally draw some fresh water from my 30 gallon barrel that has been frozen since December. I can't even see any of my bushes or shrubs under all this snow. I can't wait just to see the ground again.:-) Xuan: I would love to see some pics of your flowering bulbs. I would also like to say to you that I am so happy to see that you are no longer getting any snow..lol -3 degrees this am with temps in my popup at 40. I hope to God that my Hoya's make it ok since I forgot to bring them in. It should be warmer from here on out, thank God. Have a happy Friday everyone! Mike

I'm very pleased you like it. Now it's up to you to keep 'em strong! Al

Great post. I tried this method this past weekend. Relative to the lawn mower method of chopping up large pine bark chunks, I found this method to be cleaner (it doesn't shoot pine chunks out the sides like a mower will), a bit slower than the mower, and produced a lot more fine particles. I have a high speed Toro leaf blower/mulcher with a metal impeller. A large percentage of the particles coming out felt like fine compost, and a large number of chunks went through looking unscathed, so I didn't get the mix of particle sizes that I was hoping for. I suppose if I had a 1/8" screen, I could have sifted out some of the fine stuff. As it was, I got about 3 gallons of material, and made a side batch of 5-1-1 to try with some peppers, but I didn't mix it in with the rest of my 5-1-1.