I planted a 12 foot red sunset maple last August and am considering fertilizing it this Spring. I've read that one should wait at least a year before fertilizing newly planted trees. I've also heard that one should indeed fertilize newly planted trees and that its growth will suffer if it's not fertilized. Can anyone give me the pros and cons of fertilizing this spring as opposed to waiting until next spring?
Thanks in advance!
Brian
Wait until next fall.
I don't know where you live but here in South Florida we use a rule of trunk diameter. For every 1" of trunk diameter you wait 30 days before fertilizing. Thus a 6" diameter tree would not get fertilized for 6 months.
If you are living within the US, check with your county extension agent for specific info. It's free and these agents are desperate for someone to talk with.
Most horticulturists, including myself, will recommend you wait until after one full growing season. If you planted in August, that would mean this coming fall or even next spring. Newly planted trees and other plants need to establish a sound root system before they attempt lots of new top growth that fertilizing will encourage.
FWIW, unless your soil is deficient, most plants do not NEED to be fertilized. That is a concept we humans have applied, assisted by fertilizer manufacturer's marketing hype, thinking that growing things require 'food'. Trees and shrubs planted outdoors in decent soil will obtain all the 'food' they need by pulling necessary nutrients and water from the soil and manufacturing their own food through a process of photosynthesis. Excessive fertilizing or fertilizing when not necessary will create more problems than it will eleviate - the plants become dependent on chemical supplements and rapid leafy growth encourages insects and diseases. A light application of a balanced, preferrably organic fertilizer once a year is more than sufficient but a regular mulching of all your plants with a good compost will achieve as much, plus improve the soil and encourage its occupants.
I have never applied a fertilizer to any of my trees (other then those grown in containers) and all are thriving - but I do have really exceptional soil. There is a long standing horticultural saying - feed the soil and you will feed the plants. Fertilizing is overly hyped.
pam - gardengal
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Of course, the energy produced by the top growth will encourage root growth. ;-) We growers of bonsai learned that years ago.
There is a LOT of hooie written about fertilizer and transplanting, and fertilizing shrubs and trees in general -- much of it, as Pam said, promoted by the fertilizer manufacturers who -- understandably -- want to sell more fertilizer. It won't _hurt_ anything to fertilize now, if you want. But your tree probably doesn't need it, especially if you have kept a wide bed of oak-leaf, or pinestraw mulch around the base of the newly planted tree. _I_ usually mix a small handful of timed-release fertilizer into the soil around the tree as I plant it, then leave it at that.
The exception might be a brand-new yard, where the developers have scrapped away all of the good topsoil, then laid turf on top of bare clay (my son in Durham, N.C. had one of these yards -- it was terrible, and almost hopeless). In that case, mulch AND a time-release fertilizer scattered over the mulch in the spring and covered with a thin layer of more mulch probably will help. The mulch is key, however.
The only shrubs that I fertilize regularly are azalea because of their compact, dense root system that does not use much of the nutrient stored in surrounding soil.
Jim Lewis - snipped-for-privacy@nettally.com - Tallahassee, FL - Only where people have learned to appreciate and cherish the landscape and its living cover will they treat it with the care and respect it should have - Paul Bigelow Sears.
I always mix Osmocote slow release (24 month) fertilizer in the area outside the root ball when I plant a tree. It encourages the roots to spread outside the root ball. I never fertilize after that. I have planted thousands of trees from conifers like metasequoia, white pine, norway spruce, larch and Douglas fir to hardwoods like red oak, cutleaf maples, white birch, fruit trees and Bradford pear.
The most important thing to do with a transplant is to quickly establish a good root system. Use a fert. higher in phosphorus and potassium, lower in nitrogen. Phosphorus aids in root growth; potassium aids in disease resistance and cold hardiness. Your soil PH is probobly just as important if not more so. Contact your agricultural agent to find the PH range for the specified plant.
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