1) Do you mean your using the green concentrated MG solution that doesn't have the minor's in it? Well, I think it has Fe, Mn, and Zn for the minors, which are the ones most likely to be absent in container soils. Missing, are the secondary macronutrients Ca, Mg, and S. To make things easy on myself, I take a quart of concentrate and add 3 tbsp of Epsom salts (this is ONLY if I'm using it on a soil I added gypsum to instead of dolomitic lime), 2 tbsp STEM micronutrient powder, and 1 tbsp of an Fe chelate formulated for high pH conditions. This is a fertilizer program I worked out to suit MY needs & yours may vary. This year I will be trying the Foliage-Pro 9-3-6 fertilizer that has a complete array of all the nutrients on a couple of groups of plants. I'm pretty excited about this fertilizer for you guys. I think it's going to prove to be a real winner and an excellent choice - especially for anyone confused by all this chatter. 2) If so how do you apply it? I mix it at half strength in a 2 gallon can (2 at a time) and hand-fertilize all my containerized plants every 1-2 weeks, depending on temperatures and how robustly they are growing. . . . can't help you with a low-pressure siphon delivery system - sorry. I'd have to go Google the info, too. Al

Yardtractor, I saw Andy's post from last night. I agree it was very informative. The one thing he broke down was chelated vs. unchelated iron. He mentioned that milorganite is a chelated iron fertilizer so it lasts longer. He then went on to talk about the foliar application from a liquid iron supplement. What I gathered from it was liquid is the best and most sure fire way to get a dark green lawn but because milorganite is chelated, it also will work. I was thinking and you're right that milorganite may provide more iron per dollar than Dr. Iron. Dr. Iron started to interest me because of how long it supposedly lasts. If it is truly 20 something weeks, that is pretty much an annual application for Bermuda vs. monthly or bi-monthly applications of milorganite. Maybe I need to listen to my wife and stop always trying to find something different or better. The regimen I have used this year has worked and I'm only about 3 weeks removed from an alfalfa application. I haven't even seen the benefits from that yet.

I want to make a distinction that may be a little fuzzy here. Fertilizing plants that are potted in clay is a little different than fertilizers for plants that are floating or maybe planted in gravel. If a plant is planted in clay soil, like lilies usually are, they can be given a complete fertilizer that contains everything including phosphate. The fertilizer is available to the plant but doesn't leach into the water because the clay contains it. Lilies like lots of phosphate to bloom well, but the phosphate would promote algae if it got into the water column. Fertilizing floating or gravel planted plants requires some care. They can be fertilized by adding the fertilizers directly to the water. If you put it in the gravel it is going to end up in the water anyway. Adding potash, nitrate, and micronutrients to the water is fine, but adding phosphate to the water is asking for algae trouble. The problem is plants like lilies really need the phosphate. I think your lilies will do better if you put them in clay and give them lots of complete fertilizer. You can also add nitrate, potash, and micronutrients to the water to feed the floating and submerged plants. They will scavenge enough phosphates from the fish waste products to grow well. This will give you healthy plants AND clear water.

Hi Runerat: here's the ingredients in Fast-Acting Encap gypsum: http://encap.net/soil-solutions/fast-acting-gypsum/#tab-id-2 GUARANTEED ANALYSIS 92% Calcium Sulfate (CaSO4) 72%Calcium (Ca) 20%Combined Sulfur (S) 16% Derived from mined gypsum ALSO CONTAINS NONPLANT FOOD INGREDIENTS:1.5% Polymers1.0% Anionic Polyacrylamide Copolymer (Emulsion)0.5% Anionic Polyacrylamide Copolymer (Solid)INERT INGREDIENTSLignosulfonates (binding agent)……………………………………………………………………. 2% *** From Straw: So the Encap Fast-Acting gypsum has 92% gypsum with 20% calcium and 16 % sulfur, plus binding agent to make it slow release. Yes, I used that Encap-fast-acting before in the planting hole of Annie L. McDowell, and the result was excellent .. since it's en-capped with binding agent, the release of sulfur was slower & safer than the CHEAP gypsum-soil-conditioner, which I got for $5 per 40 lb. bag from Menards. I didn't kill any earth-worms with that Encap-gypsum, but I killed plenty of earth-worms with the cheap-gypsum, since it's NOT covered with an inert-coating. The cheap gypsum releases ACIDIC sulfur all at once, thus great to break up heavy clay many months in advance. Earthworms will crawl back in, once the sulfur is washed down to the bottom of the hole. The Encap-fast-acting is best to put into the planting hole, then plant a rose immediately .. the sulfur is released gradually so it won't harm roots as much as the Cheap-gypsum soil conditioner ... which is recommended in the fall to break up clay, many months in advance before planting.