Save Money Blend Your Own Fertilizers

Q.  I have desertscape bushes and plants; Lantana, bottlebrush, Japanese blueberry, Texas sage and Furmans red autumn sage.  I am looking for a basic fertilizer to use on all bushes and plants but am confused by so many products available.  Miracle Gro offers an all-purpose 24-8-16 fertilizer but I also know that some 10-10-10 fertilizers. are suggested as milder applications. My blueberry leaves are particularly hard hit by insects.

Ammonium sulfate, 21–0–0
is a good nitrogen fertilizer
to use alone or blend with other fertilizers.

A. I generally recommend two types of fertilizers and they will usually address most situations. One fertilizer should be high in nitrogen, the first number, but low in phosphorus, the second number, or phosphorus absent. This fertilizer is used to push the growth of leaves and stems but not flowers and roots. This fertilizer would be used a lot.

The second fertilizer is one that is high in phosphorus but low or nearly absent in nitrogen. This fertilizer would be used at the time of planting to encourage better rooting of plants. This fertilizer would also be used only once a year on all flowering plants.

The third number is potassium. I didn't mention it but whenever you can get this third number high it is always good and never a problem. Always be cautious about adding phosphorus too often in a fertilizer but don't worry about nitrogen or potassium.

From these two fertilizers mix the two together and make a third fertilizer that has both nitrogen and phosphorus as a general purpose fertilizer. Use this mix only occasionally. Flowering and fruiting plants would get one application each year of the high phosphorus fertilizer. The rest of the time they would be lightly fed with the high nitrogen fertilizer when needed depending on the plant.

Triple super phosphate, 0-45-0,
is a good high phosphate fertilizer
that can be used alone to promote
roots, flowers and fruit.
It can be blended easily with ammonium sulfate.

These fertilizers will work for nearly all of your landscape and garden plants. When encouraging roots, flowers and fruit, use the phosphorus fertilizer but use it only once a year. The remainder of the time use the high nitrogen fertilizer in small amounts every 4 to 8 weeks when you want to promote leaf and stem growth.

The iron fertilizer is also a good fertilizer to have on hand. It is only applied once each year just before spring growth to those plants that tend to require iron because of yellowing. Only a small amount is needed each year.

Your blueberries problem is probably not insect or damage from disease. The problem is most likely soil and climate related. Japanese blueberries require a more acidic soil which you can encourage with the addition of compost and wood chip mulch to the soil surface.

Grow More 20-20-20
is a water-soluble fertilizer
very similar to Miracle Gro or Peters
but much less expensive.

The Miracle Gro products, Peters, etc. are very good products but they tend to sell you several of their fertilizers for different purposes when you really don't need all of them if you understand some of the basics. There are other products such as Grow More fertilizers but less expensive than these and will do the same job. I hope this helps.