Anybody use these for roses and/or other plants, both ornamental and edible?
I have "regular" rose and other foods in granular form. Was just about to apply & thought I'd try the spikes.
Just curious if those spikes deliver on their promise to supply long- lasting food to roots.
HB
I don't have any scientific data to back it up with (er, but then I bet the companies pitching them really don't either), but what you're paying for is little more than a given quantity of some ratio of fertilizer designed to dissolve over time. as it's undoubtedly NOT an organic product, your run-of-the-mill granular fertilizers do the same thing, but you need a measuring teaspoon to dole them out instead of
1-2-3 sticks per pot.I'd brew up a batch of compost tea and just water with that though. Oh wait, I believe that's what I already do (though to be honest, no potted plants in the house, and not too many in the garden that aren't already planted with a substantial quantity of compost already).
Being an elephant's child, I did try them on some miniature roses many years ago... I had a couple of dozen of the same cultivar in a small bed and someone had given me a package of rose spikes. Can't say I saw any difference between the half of the bed that had rose spikes and the other half that had weekly dousings of Peters' general purpose, half strength.
Soil was basic prairie loam that had had some well aged horse manure dug in, dry grass clippings for mulch.
Kay
I don't think they'ed work well for roses and other small shallow rooted plants but they work very well for large deep rooted plants like trees. A few of those large spikes pounded in around a tree's drip line gives very noticable results and over a long time (years), whereas surface fertilizing does virtually nothing for trees. In any event don't over fertilize or you'll do more harm than good. Plants don't need much fertilizer if any, they receive most of their energy via photosynthesis.
You are confusing the beginners by once again being partly right and partly wrong.
Plants don't get any energy from soil nutients they get it all from photosynthesis. They get minerals from the soil and it silly to generalise about plants not needing much because of the very wide range of requirements. Try growing a heavy feeding annual (eg corn) in the same place year after year without replacing the minerals they take up and you will see your yield decline markedly as the soil fertility declines due to lack of nutrients. It would be better to say that one should make the rate of application of fertiliser suit the circumstances, at least you got one thing right, that excess can be worse than too little.
I just consulted my stars for the week in the local paper and they said the response to this post would be strong on invective and weak on facts. Let's see if astrology works.
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