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Gardening

Find tips and tricks to make your garden or allotment flourish on our Gardening forum.

Plant Feed -what are you all using?

3 replies

70isaLimitNotaTarget · 21/03/2021 18:06

There's no vegetable garden , it's pretty much lawn and some shrubs .
We're waiting to have some work done ( paving and turf_) so at the moment buying a few plants to grow on and plant out later .

Heavy clay soil , some will be in pots some will be planted out . I have a huge composter ready to use but mainly try to find plants which thrive in clay .

What plant foods work best though?
Liquid ones to water in or granuals to mix in before planting ?

So much choice out there !

OP posts:
NineOClockOnASaturday · 21/03/2021 18:42

I have heavy clay soil too, so I try to follow the dictum about "don't feed the plant, feed the soil" and use things that will add humus to the soil. So at this time of year I'm mulching the greedy plants like roses and clematis with farmyard manure or homemade compost and generally topping up the beds with composted bark. Later in the summer I'll be adding some pelleted chicken manure and watering flowering plants with tomato Maxicrop.

Janedownourlane · 21/03/2021 21:23

We have heavy clay and have just this weekend covered it with a mulch of rotted manure and hotbin compost mixed with some shop bought compost. If I need any flower or vegetable feed, I would use chicken pellets, blood ,fish & bone or organic liquid seaweed feed. The seaweed feed always works well and can be used quite dilute-Monty Don always seems to use it quite strong. Only thing is, it stains patio slabs so needs careful mixing!
We plant with a mix of compost and grit/sharp sand in the planting hole. Clay has a lot of nutrients and is not a bad soil if you can keep it from getting too dry (or wet in winter!). Ours is now full of worms as we continually add humus to the top. We have had success with many plants that are not supposed to like clay, but I do take some out and over-winter them in pots til Spring. Avoid digging too deeply as you can get a horrid sticky subsoil coming to the surface. Good luck.

MereDintofPandiculation · 22/03/2021 12:17

You should have enough nutrients in the soil, and over-fertilising so that nitrogen gets washed out into the wider environment is a problem for our wild plants and for our waterways. Agree with "feed the soil not the plants" - mulch, add lots of humus. Clay plus humus makes a really good rich soil. Just avoid things which say they need a well-drained soil - you'll have plenty of choice.

I've not added fertiliser in 30 years and there's been no decline in fertility, I just compost nearly everything from the garden, and add vegetable peelings etc and some cardboard, to compensate for the nutrients I remove by taking the really prickly stuff to the tip.

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