Keep us posted. I understand most of the ingredients but what is the ammonia supposed to do?

I would strongly recommend against such homemade fertilizer recipes. The reasons are many.

Primarily, there are very good reasons commercial fertilizer formulas are what they are - it's because they have been scientifically developed and tested to work. None of us amateur growers can come even close to refuting and improving on their formulas.

One exception is "bloom booster" formulas (which this formula calls for, rather ironically) - those, unfortunately, are based more on marketing and consumer demand, rather than on solid science. Call this problem #2 with this recipe.

That said, I do like Dyna-Gro fertilizers generally (all their other formulas) - because they contain many micro-nutrients in addition to the macronutrients present in any fertilizer.

#3. When you add a single-ingredient fertilizer like epsom salts or B12, to a broad general purpose fertilizer like Dyna-Gro (which already should contain all the nutrients in the right quantities and proportions, if it's any good) - all you do is grossly overdose on those single ingredients. At best, it leads to excess of that ingredient, the plant not being able to take that in, and your time and money being leached away into the drain, literally. At worst though, the plant will take that in, and you will lose it or make it suffer.

#4. Molasses are good to use, but only in cases where you can wash the stuff off, after the plant could absorb as much of the solution as it needed. This means soaking tired cuttings, or bare-root plants after long international transit. If you use this stuff as fertilizer, you invite growth of bacteria in all that sugary goodness in the soil. This cannot possibly lead to anything good.

#5. Why is ammonia in the recipe? It makes the potting mix more alkaline, but this assumes there is a need for that, which is not at all true for everybody.

#6. The recipe's implication is that you pre-mix it and you store it, and use it up gradually. Imagine all the beer and molasses and vitamins premixed, sitting somewhere in your kitchen... Zeus only knows how they all interact with each other, and what kinds of fungalnasties will grow in this mix. I would not use that potion for anything even a day later, yet along weeks and months.

I could go on, like #7, why the hell is the water you mix this in warm? Watering water should always be room temperature (which feels COOL to your skin, because your skin is above room temp!), otherwise you risk stressing the plants. Rains in nature feel cool to the touch, so THAT is what plants are perfectly adapted to.

Or #8 why is beer there? Considering it contains basically water, yeast and sugar, you are using essentially an expensive placebo.

Anyway, I hope it's more than enough to convince you to move on.

FINALLY FOUND THE ORIGIONAL POST FOR THIS.

"I mix my own potting medium which drains very fast and tends to dry
out quickly in the gh this time of year so I have to water about every
other day or so. My watering routine is for waterings 1-3 to be with the
beer formula. Waterings 4 & 5 are with straight water to flush the
soil and then once a month when I can remember to do it I water with
fish fertilizer.

I've been criticized and harassed to no end on other forums for even
talking about the beer formula,people saying that i'm harming my plants
and that it doesn't work and so on and so forth but i've been using it
now for over 2 years and as you can see from my pictures my plants are
very happy and healthy and HUGE!!!!! Basically what those people on the
other forum couldn't understand was that I didn't need them or anyone
else to tell me how to grow my plants,simple as that. I'm obviously
doing a great job. I do not try to push the beer formula on anyone.
People ask me what I use and I tell them. I also tell them that what
works for me may or may not work for you,all you can do is try it and
see."

The title of the thread (which is very cool because some pics are still out there from 08) is called "show us your big one"

Here's the link: http://forums.gardenweb.com/discussions/1964360/show-us-your-big-one.

dmichael, who brought up that beer recipe, was actually a very good Hoya grower. He does not grow Hoyas anymore, unfortunately for the rest of us. This was before my time as a Hoya nut, but his fame still lives. :-)

So, I dunno. I guess the formula does no harm, as evident from his plants. Still, placebo effect is very powerful. The formula is better than placebo - I mean there IS commercial fertilizer in there lol. Much of the rest of it IS placebo though. If there is no clear documented scientifically proven benefit to an ingredient, there is no objective reason to use the ingredient. Maybe he had good growing conditions - which are ALWAYS more important to get right than any potions you can ever use. I think he is in North Carolina - that is good climate. And he is definitely skilled as a grower, which is important, of course. It's not the formula that did the trick - at least not the majority of the ingredients in the formula.

I stick to the commercial brand fertilizers and some natural kelp. I even use commercial brands of fungicides (both synthetic and bio). My husband works for Bayer CropScience and he keeps telling me use what millions of dollars have been spent on studies and only use stuff when you see a problem. I tend to be an over carer (umbrella mom) to my Hoyas and citrus and will use products to be preventative and my husband yells at me to "leave them be until there's a problem".. I know I should as Hoyas kinda thrive on neglect but I'm so paranoid of pests.

Ive spent so much money on Hoyas this year only to have them decline and die for no apparent reason. I check them everyday because I can't afford to throw money away. I just had an Australis Tenuipes that was thriving with new growth sh_t the bed for no apparent reason that I could tell.

Imonstella, so true. The more I neglect my Hoya, the bigger they grow and the more they bloom.