If your soil is in reasonably good condition and fertile, you may never need to fertilize. Same if it is planted in a lawn that gets regular fertilization. Really, the only way you can tell if fertilization of any sort is necessary is to have a soil test done and then supply what might be missing. Fertilizing a plant when not necessary is often counterproductive and results in lush, weak growth that is vulnerable to diseases, insects and environmental stress

Unless you are growing in containers, almost nothing planted in the ground requires routine fertilization.....plants get what they need in the way of nutrients from the surrounding soil. I can't imagine any tree needing fertilization 3 times a year unless planted in pure sand!!

Since we're at a time of the year where plants are going dormant, or are already there, there's not much need for typical fertilizer. Still, roots are growing below ground, so a handful of low, or no-nitrogen, fertilizer will help that process. I find that many newly installed plants take a while (a year or two) to get sufficient roots into the native soil where they can tap onto the existing fertility, if it's there. Next spring, observe if the leaves are a rich, deep green ... or a a washed out, or yellowed green. The latter suggests that fertilizer is in order.

I'm in an area of high sand content (Florida) and Nitrogen does not seem to stick around too long. Being water soluble, it's leached to lower levels, and finally out of reach, by frequent rains. I generally apply fertilizer 2x/year. The longer a large plant is in the ground, the less it will need fertilizer.

Insofar as "best" fertilizer ...? It doesn't matter. In the growing season the 'October Glory' is going to be happy with anything that contains Nitrogen, Phosphorous and Potassium ... so some rose or lawn fertilizer would do it.