On 19/08/2015 09:58, Another John wrote:
My wife tends to be the plants grower, whilst I tend to see to the
structural and tidying side of things (iow, I do all the hard work!).

My wife loves to sow, plant, and watch her plants growing, but she's
hopeless at feeding them once they're "up" and/or established. I worry
about this. So:

(1) Shouldn't we be feeding the garden flowers? These are predominantly
annuals, sown by my wife in her yearly, delighted, absorbed, frenzy of
sowing, tending, overseeing, transplanting, and finally planting out.
We also have many perennials. (We also have roses, but these are
"mine", and I feed them with Toprose at the usual times.)
I occasionally fling Growmore over the soil, but with no real organised
approach.

That is probably good enough unless you see yellowing leaves or other
obvious signs of deficiency. Plants in open ground can usually find what
they need. In pots or hanging baskets then a feed of Phostrogen in
summer or similar or slow release fertiliser is appropriate.


(2) And what's the best way to feed indoor plants? We have some that
are years (and years) old, which rarely get repotted, sometimes suffer
drought, and often suffer overwatering. Still, they survive -- the
miracle of plant life :-/ I feel we should feed them mo are those
little sticks that you can get the best way to do this?

Phostrogen every now and then or appropriate specialist feed for orchids
and
other plants that are touchy about the exact NPK and trace element mix.

Every year around Autumn I swear I'll get a load of rotted manure, and
distribute it around the borders, and thus not have to worry about
feeding ... unfortunately I've never done this yet.

Worth doing for heavily used allotments but fresh manure will scorch
many plants and encourage others into too much soft growth. Flowering
plants and soft fruit benefit from a high potash feed if you want more
flowers.

Lastly, I do make compost, and I do distribute that each year in Autumn
or early Spring, but I always feel that this is thin stuff compared to a
load of farmyard manure.

Some manure might no go amiss, but unless you are into Organic(TM)
growing there is nothing wrong with synthetic fertilisers like Growmore
granules or Phostrogen as a soluble feed.

And lastly lastly: in case it's of any interest: our garden isn't that
big -- maybe 70' by 30' at the back, and maybe 20' by 12' at the front.


--
Regards,
Martin Brown