About The Long Island Gardener Expertise Do you know the wrong fertilizer will keep your plants from blooming?
Do you know that too much Nitrogen can kill your grass, even if it does not burn the roots? Do you know that Roses need a LOT of Nitrogen to bloom -- and why is that?
There's some complex chemistry in those plant foods. The secrets behind N-P-K are the key to the ultimate lawn, the the biggest flowers, the most fruits and vegetables. And if you don't get it right, you could be sorry.
I'll show you what you did wrong, and how to fix it.
Experience Homeowner with gardens indoors and outdoors, lawns back and forth. I wrote my first gardening column for our college newspaper, teaching roomates about the right way to feed those windowsills gardens. Today I look for challenges. Organic Fertilizers are the key to proper feeding of all our plants. Can you make your own fertilizer? Some people think so -- but there are side effects. I have been there, done that for 54 years and there is nothing like the voice of experience when it comes to Horticulture and Fertilizers.
Publications Numerous and sundry but only in college did I write about plants.
Education/Credentials B.A., Botany and Mass Communications.
Fertilizer - Best Ratio to Mix Coffee Grounds, Cow Manure and Compost?
Expert: The Long Island Gardener - 8/4/2008
Question Interested in knowing if the combination could be effective, and if so, the best ratio of mixing coffee grounds/cow manure/compost to make fertilizer.
Answer We can't determine this with your Compost because we don't know what went in, therefore we don't know what's left.
But we can figure for Coffee Grounds and Manure N-P-K ratio:
Coffee Grounds: 20-3-2
Cow Manure: roughly 6-2-5
If you mix them 50/50 you have a high-Nitrogen 26-5-7 fertilizer. But you need to know the pH of this mixture, because it could be VERY Spicy! It's the Manure that throws that God Only Knows variable into the N-P-K equation.
