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Old 26-06-2007, 10:02 PM posted to uk.rec.gardening
K K is offline
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First recorded activity by GardenBanter: Jul 2006
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Default Daisyless Livingstone daisies

Andy Spragg writes
On Sun, 24 Jun 2007 21:53:11 GMT, Pam Moore wrote:

On Sun, 24 Jun 2007 15:48:57 +0100, K wrote:

Andy Spragg writes
On Sat, 23 Jun 2007 23:46:26 +0100, Bob Hobden wrote:

"Andy Spragg" wrote ...
I planted a bed of Livingstone daisies a couple of months ago, having dug
and enriched the soil. The plants have grown really well - I've
never seen
such healthy-looking mesembryanthemums - only fly in the ointment is not
one of them has yet produced a single flower. Any ideas what's going on
here?


I think that the answer here may be the fact that you have made the
soil too rich. Too much richness in the soil gives lots of leaf
growth and fewer flowers. What ever you do, don't feed them any more.

Pam in Bristol


Mmm. an answer elsewhere in this thread, does that mean you would /not/
recommend using sulphate of potash? Or does that not count as feeding?

As a very rough rule of thumb, nitrogen encourages leaf growth, potash
encourages flowers. So if you want to encourage flowers/fruit use a high
potash fertiliser intended for roses or tomatoes rather than an all
round fertiliser.

Second rule of thumb - a lot of things plod along very happily while
nutrients are in good supply, but try to produce seed and disperse their
offspring if local conditions seem rubbish. Doesn't work for everything,
by any means, but a bit of stress (hot dry area, low nutrient, being
potbound) can encourage some things into flowering.

--
Kay