Plant food

Do you experienced GYO gardeners use different plant food for dif veg/fruit types?

Just reading an article on liquid plant food which advertises separate tomato, salad, vegetable, chilli and strawberry liquid plant food.

How often are you feeding? All my crops are in tubs, sacks, raised beds.

Am I right in thinking liquid food is for none root veg? Should I be feeding root veg anything?

Thank you in advance.

 

Quite a can of worms is the subject of feeding, you could get 100 replies below this and you would struggle to find two matching. So I can only really tell you what I do, as most will below.

I generally use well rotted manure to enrich the soil, "blood fish and bone" at planting time then my own homemade comfrey liquid feed as plants start to fruit/flower.

Blood fish and bone is a good general all round organic fertiliser that gets your plants off to a good start and will continue to feed for a few months so I plant everything with it. I buy it by the sackful and it costs around £15-16

Comfrey liquid feed I make myself. I grow the plants myself, harvest them then process into a think liquid feed, this feed I water down to the colour of weak tea then divide it between two watering cans and water it down some more. Then I use this EVERY time I water with a can.

Some people feed once a week or so but I think of it like this. Feed on a Monday, then Tuesday, Weds thurs etc etc, water only, to my mind this dilutes the feed and washes it away. I would rather water daily with a small ammount of feed every time, so there is always some there for the plants. It's all very much a personal thing.

Steve...

 

Thanks. Not at the stage of making my own feed product. If you were in my position (novice) - would you just use a genetal tom feed on everything?

 

Very much agree with Steve R. You'll get 101 answers. To me the MOST important thing with growing anything is sunshine, the growing medium the plant is growing in, plus water. I am fortunate and have a huge garden which likewise produces vast quantities of compost/leaf mould plus I have a horse which never (groan) stops producing manure. My main job in my garden is to continually be improving the soil. By increasing my soil's fertility I feed nothing except my Tomatoes and Cucumbers which grow in a greenhouse plus my Agapanthus (in pots)get a dose every now and again of Tomato feed. I feed my Toms and Cucs every watering once they have set fruit. Cheepo Chempack soluble feed. I'd spend a fortune if I bought ready mixed products as have a 20x 8ft greenhouse stuffed with Toms and Cucs.
Manufacturers are very good at convincing people you need this that and the next thing to keep their cash registers full! My advice would be to follow Steve's suggestion of Blood Fish and Bone or get good old Growmore (cheap) and use either or on the ground you are going to grow root veg in, a few weeks before sowing/planting. Try and get your hands on some compost/ manure during the winter and dig this into the soil where you will be planting veg. Sunshine, good fertile soil and correct amounts of water are much more important to plants IMO than some so called all singing all dancing "miracle" feed!