Spring will soon be approaching here in Louisiana, and I would like to hear your thoughts on affordable commercial fertilizer for fruit trees? I have about 20 young fruit trees (pear, stone fruit, etc.) that have been planted in the ground for 1-3 years now, and would like your thoughts on commonly available fertilizer? Also are there any benefits to timed release, Osmocote, etc?
The reason I ask is that I have a relative by marriage that owns an agricultural fertilizer business, and they have started packing blends in retail size bags and selling them through some local nurseries, so I may be able to buy it at trade prices.
The best thing to start out is to send in for a soil test. It’s really hard to know what fertilizer to put down, when you don’t have a baseline for the soil. Once you do a soil test, you can then put together the cheapest source of the minerals/nutrients for your soil.
In terms of the basic NPK, ammonium nitrate, diammonium phosphate, and potash are generally the most cost effective sources for those nutrients in bulk.
If you don’t want to do a soil test, your relative probably has a good idea of the soil composition in your area. Your relative may not know the nutrient requirements of peaches, but if you know what the soil contains, you can figure out what nutrients need to be added for your various fruit trees.
You may be limited to bagged fertilizer (instead of bulk) for only 20 trees, so you may not get the best deal that way.
If you had enough to rent a fertilizer cart, the elevator will blend anything you want pretty cheap, but you are generally looking at a ton of fertilizer minimum, even for the smallest cart.
Just like anything, stuff packaged/bagged for residential is about 4X the price or more vs. larger bulk prices. Unfortunately, it’s a rip-off for the little guy.
I do need to get new soil tests ran, I have the results of some that were ran 15 or so years ago on the native soil, I don’t have them in front of me at the moment, but as I recall the only big deficiency was Magnesium. I will try to post those to this thread in the morning. As to the single women I am not sure, I will have to check, though I should warn you that they belong to a very conservative religion, Holdeman Mennonite, one step up from being Amish, they don’t have TV’s or internet in their homes, for many years could only have AM radios in their cars (to listen to farm weather reports, etc.).
The local country stores in Virginia often buy fertilizer by the pallets and sell at discounts that usually run 25% off. Example - I can buy a 50 lbs bag of 10-10-10 for the same price - maybe cheaper than what Lowes or Home Depot offers a 40 lbs bag. The only difference I have seen is that sometimes the country store brand has a noticeable odor.
With 20 small, young fruit trees you arent going to need much fertilizer. There is no need to fertilize the area where there are no tree roots. All you are doing then is encouraging growth from other vegetation that is going to compete for water with the trees and requiring more mowing. Also as Olpea already mentioned fertilizing with no soil test and not taking into account how much growth those trees showed last year is poor management. You might not even need to fertilize.
No luck finding the soil analysis reports yet, they were not where I thought they were. As to the need for fertilizer, I do have more than the 20 relatively young pear and stone fruit trees mentioned above, some of which may be able to utilize the same fertilizer, it is just those were the ones I was most concerned about getting advice on. In addition I have 30 blackberry vines, 3 mature european pears, 3 mature, and 5 young citrus trees, 5 fig trees of various sizes (the largest is about 12 ft tall and 15 ft wide), and 16 blueberry bushes ranging from 2-20+ years old. I will also be planting 5 or 6 Mayhaw trees, and hopefully a couple of more citrus this spring.
You are talking about $10 worth, at most. Straight urea is the cheapest source of N and is usually all you need until trees start to bear. About a half cup spread at the base in early spring and another in late spring should do you. If your pH needs adjustment, that is a different question and your budget could soar towards $30 or so.
The free wood mulch mentioned would probably do much more to accelerate establishment than any fertilizer. It holds available water while reducing evaporation, suppresses weeds, provides lots of K and feeds beneficial micro-organisms in the soil, Of course, it may also encourage voles, but they can be managed fairly cheaply as well.
The native soil has a pH of about 5.6 which I do treat with lime around the young stone fruit, however I suspect this is not needed due to the existence of old dying no longer productive peach and plum trees that were planted in the 1980’s which I have been slowly removing over the last few years, as well as 30+ ft tall pear trees that went many years with no formal care. Also the soil is a fine sandy loam soil with moderate to good drainage, (local soil survey states it as depending on part of the yard Beauregard or Blevins soil series Official Series Description - BLEVINS SeriesOfficial Series Description - BEAUREGARD Series ) The area tends to get around 70 inches of rainfall annually, though multi month long drought does occasionally occur. A pH of 5.6 with these soil conditions seems to be right at the acceptable low end for most fruit trees and citrus as well as the upper end for rabbit eye blueberries which most reference material state need pH below 5.5.
grow a patch of bocking 14 comfrey . in 2 years you get free organic fertilizer and they look nice and attract bees. very easy to grow. will grow even in poor soil but grows really big in good soil. bugs don’t bother them. research it. . better for your soil as it adds organics as well as the fertilizer element. i can get 3 crops a year in maine. down south it would produce year round for you. the bocking hybrids are sterile so there is no seed to spread. just make sure where you put it is where you want it as its hard to get rid of it once established. grows from root cuttings.
Some harmful bugs may be attracted by comfrey. Broad leaf herbs often don’t mix that well with fruit trees- where I am they attract tarnished plant bugs and stink bugs- is comfrey different?
i haven’t seen much bug damage on it. a nibble here and there but whatever took a taste doesn’t stay on the plant or do much damage… as i cut it , i keep a eye out for bugs, but other than a few spiders., i don’t see any. i think the little hairs that cover the leaves deter pests. last season, i had a stink bug problem in my strawberrries but my comfrey 4ft away was untouched.
What I mean is that the broad leafs harbor plant bugs- in my region this is a problem. Grasses have a different pest complex that doesn’t include as many fruit tree enemies.
well a easy way to rid the bugs/ molds is to dry the leaves in the sun for awhile. then place them around your trees. i know a lot of permaculturists in europe grow the comfrey around the drip line of their trees so they can chop/drop right where it is. i would think that if pests were a issue, they wouldn’t grow them together. i have 2 comfrey 3ft from my apple trees and so far no unusual pest issues. your warmer than me and could have different pests to deal with. if you want comfrey just grow it on the outside of your orchard and dry leaves a few days on the lawn. some people dry it completely and store it as a powdered fertilizer. a little goes a long way.