Before I divulge this secret you need a little back ground.
When I first starting developing a mania for daylilies I joined the E-Mail Robin of the American Hemerocallis Society. Back in 2001 this was a very lively and outspoken group comprised of other "maniacal" daylily people, from noted hybridizers to newbie's.
If you weren't careful about what you were posting, you'd wind up engulfed in "flames".
Sometimes the threads would stop just short of a hair pulling match. I loved it!
Fast forward a decade later. Our own sweet little Granny mentioned using Miracle Grow and got "flamed". I was shocked.
Now, before I admit my secret, I'm putting on my "flame proof helmet".
I use Miracle Grow.
I use the potting mix and the fertilizer.
I learned gardening from my mother, she swore by it.
Used correctly it is a good product.
I had a group of stunted seedlings that after a month had hardly grown. As an experiment I repotted some of them into 3 oz cups of Miracle Grow. In less then two weeks they quadrupled in size.
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| Lettuce and escarole revitalized. |
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| 'Ruby' lettuce. |
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| 'Gentilina' lettuce. |
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| 'Full Heart Batavian' escarole. |
The tomato seedlings were not stunted, but really took off when they were repotted into the mix. These are in 4 inch pots.
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| 'Victor' tomato. |
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| 'Silvery Fir Tree' tomato. |
Let's clear up few misconceptions. Miracle Grow is owned by Scott's. Scott's is NOT owned by Monsanto. Using this product in no way goes to help fill Monsanto's coffers. I know it's not organic, but what I produce by using it is much safer than what I would buy at the super market. Remember all those great flowers from last year? They got a dose every other week. I stand by my results and what I learned from my mother.
Hi Ed
ReplyDeleteI guess I need to put on my asbestos suit--I too use miracle grow per direction and on selective plants. My seedlings were looking pretty weak and I started to use it last week and after I transpalnt them, I will switch to an organic product. But there are times miracle grow does the trick.
Lisa
Lisa, I was amazed at the rate of growth on those lettuce seedlings. I use the potting mix for all my outdoor pots, but never on seedlings. I'm definately going to be doing more trials with it. I guess I'm "semi" organic, as everything else I use organic.
DeleteDo you mean you don't use MG potting soil to start seeds? It looks like you are using it to pot up seedlings in your example above?
DeleteI think the reason the you would get flamed would be the Scott's Miracle Grow scandal that happened I think earlier this year. They had illegally put insecticides in bird seed(which they plead guilty to). People were pretty shocked about it. It wouldn't surprise me if some had started boycotting the company. It isn't something I followed really closely. I don't buy their products anyway. I used to use Miracle Grow when I was just starting to garden, but honestly spraying every couple of weeks is way too much of a PITA for me to keep at it. Plus with our wet climate spraying the leaves with liquid on a regular basis is not a good idea. Then I got into organic gardening and stuck with that. It works just as well for me and I tend to have less insect issues. And I don't have to spray all the time. I do hate to spray.
ReplyDeleteDaphne, I was unaware of the bird seed scandal. I'll have to check it out. From sites I've been to around the internet their is a common misconception that Scotts is owned by Monsanto. I personally do not agree with Monsanto's business practices and do boycott their seeds from their subsidiary Seminis. This was a big a adjustment as I had to give up many of my favorites: Tomatoes 'Big Beef', 'Celebrity', 'Lemon Boy', pepper 'Bell Boy' to name a few. I do almost everything else organically, this is my one vice.
DeleteI don't use the liquid fertilizer as a spray, just as a liquid fertilizer. One of the benefits of a small garden is that I can actually hand water with a watering can. It takes an entire morning, but I can examine each plant this way.
One of the benefits of not having a large following is that I probably won't get any negative comments.
Even though I now grow organically, I say whatever works for you!
ReplyDeleteI did at one time use Miracle Grow. I stopped using it when my son, who did a lot of work for one of "The Scott's" at their home told me that "they don't use the stuff at their home, so it must not be safe".
Robin, I find that very interesting and very revealing. It probably won't make me stop using it, although if what Daphne told me is true, that could change things.
DeleteI'm like Granny, 98% organic. I'll never use non-organic pestacides due to the enormous bird and butterfly population here.
I see no reason to 'flame' anyone - you choose what works for you. For my edible garden everything is organic, but all flowers in front of the house get a doze of MG fertilizer in the spring because I love my roses :)
ReplyDeleteJenny, those were the days back on the daylily robin. Mention 'Stella D'Oro' or certain other things and your screen was in danger of melting. Things got so ugly between two very prominent hybridizers that one got banned.
DeleteFunny, that's one thing my roses don't get in the spring. They get a powerful mixture of manure/ alfalfa tea along with a feeding of rosetone. The MG comes later in the season :)
I feed mine with mix of compost/manure about a month after the first green leafs come out and mix of coffe grinds and mashed bananas every other weekend afterwards. :)
DeleteThank you for taking my side....I *heart* you. Oh, I think I've told you that before ;-)
ReplyDeleteI don't use the spray fertilizer by MG, I use fish emulsion and/or a pelleted organic fertilizer. If I wanted to use the MG liquid, I would do so and not blink an eye over it. I do not use insecticides of any kind in my vegetable garden. I'd say my garden is 98% organic, and as you said, that's better than most produce one would buy.
One of your fish just swam by at the bottom of my screen. I thought it was a bug, and darned near killed my computer!
LOL! I'm sorry you almost killed your computer, I contantly forget about them!
DeleteI told you I'd do this post eventually. Since my following is so much smaller than yours, I'll probably come out unscathed. I still don't understand why some folks get so nasty about it.
By the way- I have to pick up some more soon fro the rest of my seed starting.
To be fair, there were only 2-3 comments that were "too hot" to post. That's not all that many out of all the followers to my blog, just enough to "burn" this old Granny ;-)
DeleteI just bought a giant bag. That will easily get me through this year and next, but the first thing I'm going to do is repot a few things that are not looking very good in hopes I can save them....then get some more lettuce started!
I use MG potting mix when I can. I love the stuff and my plants look great. Other than MG potting mix (and an ant poison outside my back yard) my garden is organic. And I feel good about the food I feed to my family. My father is a farmer in Texas and I have seen the amount of chemicals they pour on their feilds. Anything we grow at home has to be better than the produce we can buy at a store.
ReplyDeleteI hope everyone keeps it nice and you do not need your fire suit. :)
@ Christy, try mixing some borax (20 Mule Team Borax in the laundry soap aisle) with white sugar, equal parts, and sprinkling it around the ant hill. I did this with our ginormous ant hills in AZ, and it really works to kill out the colony! Of course, don't put it where your dog can lick it up :-O
DeleteChristy, thanks for the support! When I have an ant problem I make a drench of dried mustard, cinnamon and hot pepper. This usually takes care of a small problem. If this fails then I will resort to something stronger.
DeleteOk, let me throw in my two cents. Yes I agree with others that anything we grow at home has to be better than the stuff in the super market. They have to be putting some pretty strong chemicals in the farmland I see around here because they don't have a single weed in acres and acres of corn.
ReplyDeleteI have also used Miracle Gro at times and don't see what the big deal is. In a perfect world, everyone would have super rich loamy soil, an unlimited amount of rich organic compost to fertilize with, and an unlimited amount of time to work their garden. The reality is most people have jobs, kids, soccer games, church activities, etc. If I want to save time and have the convenience of using Miracle Gro or any product for that matter, who is anyone else to say something. It is a miracle, (no pun intended) that I have time to even do a garden. As they say, "time is money", therefore I will use artificial fertilizers and pesticides in moderation when necessary. I would love to be 100% organic, but I simply don't have the time.
Kris, I agree with you 100%. I don't have the time or the resources to be 100% organic. If someone can point me to an organic fertilizer that gives the same results, I'm willing to try it!
ReplyDelete