This was last year's germination and it had shed its leaves during winter but has releafed to show me it is an Oak. It has violin shaped leaves. Which Oak is that? So far it is thriving and I hope it continues. I will feed it miracle grow and will repot when it outgrows this one. Jackie
Jackie
What you would be doing is adding some of the essential elements as a fertilizer which has been mislabeled as plant food. If you are a ghost flower you won't but most plants manufacture their own food and are considered autotrophs. Humans are heterotrophs which means they have to have some one or something else manufacture our food for us. I would at least only use half of what they recommend. Urea is most likely in the fertilizer and that can play games in the rhizosphere which is in the rhizoplane. Information on rhizosphere can be found here:
I just made a decision to not use a product with urea for just that reason. I found a solution of many microelements and some biostimulators (sic?) with very little nitrogen. It just happens to be organic and natural. I would have used it even if it was not organic. It had the elements that I was looking for and not with urea and not with fast release nitrogen, so I use it..
I hope you are not offended, but I will share some definitions I enjoy understanding. many people on this list dispute them. They were something my professor taught me, with great effort on my part, to help me understand trees and their associates as well as the treatments, we as humans impose. The more clearly he defined his terms the better I would understand what he was saying. Many around the world have learned a great deal from him. E.g., Spain, Italy, Germany, Australia, etc.
Food is a substance that provides and energy source, mostly. Nutrient is a substance that provides an energy source, elements, and other substances essential for life, in types and amounts that can provide a healthy life. Fertilizer is a substance that provides elements, as salts mostly, or in bonded forms, that require microorganisms to alter to forms that can be absorbed by plants.
Do you have fast internet that I could scan and send copies of pages on specific seeds to you?
John
It is not a live oak. These shed their leaves in early spring. If the leaves were intensely red at time of shed, its a red oak. All the oaks I've seen, their leaves more resemble the bass violin, not a violin in shape.
The best advice I can give you when the sapling is ready, plant it immediately in the location you intend. Don't spoil it with additives, you're intensifying the shock at the time of transplant. After transplant, let it be. A slow, slow drip of water if dry is okay. Idea is to get the rootage motivated in the downward direction, and adjusted to the soil its planted in.
Thanks, Dave. Very helpful. Jackie>
Jackie
One thing to know is that over fertilization of nitrogen fertilizer will create a predisposition for sucking insects. In other words, nitrogen dose can be the cause of sucking insects.
You mean that nitrate deposition in the leaves of plants, caused by salts of nitrates (NO3-) from chemical fertilizers, will attract insects who wish to eat those leaves for there nitrate content. It isn't caused by over fertilization, or over application, call it what you may, it is caused by the use of chemical fertilizers.
You say chemical fertilizers as if there was a fertilizer that was not made up of chemicals. If I use water to water a tree it is a chemical. H2O! What kind of fertilizer is there that is not made up of chemicals?
We have known for a while how to stimulate growth: add a nitrogen source to soil or leaves and shoots will grow bigger. What we cannot do directly is add an energy source to trees. When growth increases, energy goes out of the system first. Then maintenance and defense must also increase after this for the added living matter. If stored energy is used to meet the added growth demands, little stored energy remains for defense, leaving a bigger plant with a smaller defense system. Any number of insects and microorganisms "know" this. The classic example is fire blight. Add nitrogen to a tree that has a little fire blight and the disease will spread rapidly. Add an overdose of nitrogen to trees and any number of sucking insects will be there.
I suggest A TOUCH OF CHEMISTRY:
Horse shit
If the leaf edges are rounded and not pointed, it is likely some kind of white oak.
Do not oever-feed it. Many oaks prefer a "lean" soil.
Where are you? If this is a western oak (e.g., Quercus lobata or valley white oak), additional care is needed. See my .
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