In case you didn't already know it, the best time to purchase most gardening supplies is in the dead of winter, because stores really like to move items leftover from the previous year. Oh..I really load up on them, and have already acquired all fertilizer needed for the upcoming growing season - and at half price. Yeehaw! Shoot....most of it came from the freaky merchandise store I frequent, too. For instance, this "Mater Magic" can be purchased at The Home Depot for $4 each, but I got 4 of them at half that. I must admit that the name is kinda pathetic, but it has an NPK value of 8-5-5. Not bad for tomatoes.....
Photo below - "GardenTone", which has an NPK value of 3-4-4. Lowes has it for $10.99, but I got 6 for $5.99 each. I really like to add this stuff during the initial planting, but opt for much more aggressive levels after fruitset occurs. Anyway, these first 2 are gonna be used exclusively in the swc/swp's being used for growing tomatoes this year - combined for a 50/50 blend of each. That should result in a fertilizer with levels at 5.5-4.5-4.5.
Photo below - There's also 4 of these containers that were purchased at Lowes. The NPK value is 12-3-13, and got them at half price, too. It'll most likely be used on stuff like corn and cucumbers, and possibly even blended with one of the others for tomatoes...Lots to think about, that's for sure.
In other news, the snow is finally gone and i'm glad! It's pretty to look at for a day or two, but i've had my fill of it for this year.
Tomato and pepper seeds will be started in 2 weeks, and i'll likely go ahead and fill the seedling flats with starting mix, and any other little tasks to get prepared for it. As stated earlier, about 100 plants will be started inside the largest propagation system, and that should leave me plenty of room for facilitating the plants in larger containers once potted up. Once that time arrives, the other 2 propagation systems will be available for them. Since the daughter wants some flowers for her yard, we may even start some from seed for that purpose, too.
Take care, and happy gardening!
EG
10 comments:
What a great deal!! I never see any gardening stuff I need on sale around here.
NIce finds! I have yet to figure out fertilizer, basically out of laziness. I'll probably be watching closer what others do this year. :) Glad your snow has gone away!
Sounds like a lot of good deals.
Haven't seen that mater magic. Will have to look for it.
That's a really great tip to get your fertilizer now, I never thought about that before.. I guess you know where I'll be after work today!
You found some great deals on fertilizer! I use GardenTone and that really was a good price :) I usually stock up on seeds at the end of the season, but that doesn't add up to much of a savings.
I need to think about a nice AP organic fertilizer I can make. I don't go for much fertilizer, just compost, but I do have a tomato blend that I throw into my SWCs at initial planting, and do some fish emulsion later in the water. With all that compost, will you really need all that? Just curious. Greaty buys though!
I've never gotten past just putting lots of manure on my beds. Laziness, really. I should be reading up on the whole thing. Thanks for the info!
~~Lori
Boy I wish I could find my fertilizers on sale. I suppose if I looked it would help.
What an awesome deal on fertilizer. Sa-weet!!
Good post. I obviously don't add enough fertilizer to my beds - no wonder I don't have huge yields. I'm like Megan - need to figure it out but lazy about it :)
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