Why Did My New Vegetables Die?

Q. We bought a yard of compost and filled a square foot garden. We roped it off and had sixteen squares planted all squares and a week later every thing is dead. What did we do wrong?

A. You mentioned you bought compost and filled a square foot garden. I hope you did not plant directly into Viragrow compost. I am assuming you meant you bought a soil mix and planted in it.

Soil mixes we carry include Tomato Lady, Premium Garden Soil Mix and Rejuvenate. These are blended soil mixes containing about 30% compost. If you plant directly into compost then everything would die. That would be a normal thing because the compost is too rich to use as a planting mix. Nothing would survive planting directly into compost.

Compost must be mixed with an existing soil at least 50/50 or with sand as it is done with bulk soil mixes or in bags.

We test all of our soil mixes in the back of our facility. Here are our raised beds filled with our soil mixes and growing some of the best the vegetables you will ever see!

If you mean you bought a soil mix and they died, this is not common but it does occur if transplants are planted directly into the mix and the soil mix is too dry. The soil mix is rich in nutrients. Nutrients in the soil compete with plants for water. If water is not available, then the nutrients win, take the water from the roots and the plants die. Always, always, always plant into moist or wet soil mix. Never plant directly into dry soil mix.

salt damage to raddichio because it is very salt sensitive

The principle nutrient responsible for this competition for water is nitrogen and your soil mix is rich in nitrogen and phosphorus. Under most wet conditions this nitrogen will move directly into transplant roots and the transplants grow and become established quickly.

Salt damage to Italian Parsley

I would water your soil mix thoroughly three or four times before you plant again. This extra watering will flush out extra nitrogen and make it "safer" to plant directly into it. This extra water removes nitrogen from our soil mixes easily. The extra nitrogen is lost to growing plants but makes it safer for you to plant into if you choose not to keep the soil wet.

I hope this works for you because so many of our customers love how plants perform in our soil mixes.

Extremely Sensitive

Green beans, parsnips, celery, radish, squash, peas, onion, carrot 

Sensitive

Cucumber, capsicum, lettuce, sweet corn, rock melon, potatoes, cauliflower, cabbage, watermelon, broccoli, pumpkin, squash, tomato

Moderately Tolerant

Asparagus, kale, garden beets.

Viragrow Delivers!