I got my soil test back and it looks like I need a lot of work. I plan to take this to the local ag fertilizer place and see if they can custom make a N-P-K mix to satisfy the recommendations. I can get them to add the lime and sulfur. What I don’t know anything about and did not receive recommendations on is the boron. I’ve read that it’s important for certain crops of which fruit and grapes are included. Does anyone have good info on this?
Katy
Most people here use Borax. I used Boric acid. The roach poison that comes in a yellow plastic bottle. It’s easily soluble and you can spray it on the foliage, which is what the university types recommend.
PS. Looks to me like you also need a modest amount of all purpose fertilizer plus a little sulfur. No big deal.
PPS. Boric acid is 17.5% Boron. So if you need to add 1 gram of Boron, that really means 6 grams of Boric acid.
Just wondering how much of the borax. I can’t really find any information on it other than “don’t put down too much”. 
Katy
As it is difficult to apply such a small amount evenly over a large area ,I mix it with lime and spread that .
Also I grew the biggest beets ever after I applied borax
Soil test results look good. High in Iron and Zinc, which peaches need. Magnesium is also good. You have some residual Nitrogen, more than most this time of year. Nitrogen will vary throughout the year. Some labs do not even test for it. The P and K is a little low but you can correct it next spring.
Ph looks ok, just a little low. You can put out lime this fall to give it time to work. At 15 foot spacing all you would need would be 2 lbs per tree. Tractor Supply has it for about $4 to $5 ($3 if you catch it on sale) for a 50# bag. Put the lime and fertilizer out at different times.
Chicken litter usually has some boron in it. You could just spread some chicken litter and see how much that brings it up. Better to have too little boron than too much. Really, if the trees are growing good I would not worry about it.
Thanks for all that information! I’ll probably spread it with my lime.
I have sooooo many questions on this. I have not ever had an official test run on this ground and was under the impression I had a pH of just over 7 because of a tester I got from Amazon. So now am I going to have to rethink everything I’ve planted? Will the limestone I add neutralize this? Or…can I now plant blueberries!!!
If I use, say 13-13-13 that leaves my P-K under treated but if I go with something like 10-26-26 it’s going to leave the nitrogen short. Which of these is the easiest to add by itself? The nitrogen?
Katy
Thanks for the input. Some of the young trees don’t look really good. Funky leaf color and little growth. They are in a smaller area of this section and I had that analyzed too but it wasn’t much different. So… just put out some lime in individual trees and fertilize in the spring with a balanced fertilizer? Should I try to cover the whole area with the lime to bring up the pH?
Katy
I would concentrate on getting the ph to around 6.5 first for most fruit garden stuff.
Then bring up the P , K. And other minerals most fruit trees don’t have high demands but cover crops and vegetables do.
I would not pay much attention to the nitrogen on your soil test. As it fluctuates through out the year ,"here one day gone tomorrow ,"instead use the amount of shoot growth as an indicator of nitrogen levels in each plant ( tree). Add nitrogen accordingly to each individual plant.
Yes I would lime the whole area
Here are a couple of the best extension articles I’ve found on soil amendments:
15 lbs of 13-13-13 will give you 1.95 lbs of NPK per 1000 sq feet. That is pretty close to the amount you need for each one. Since the trees are not growing vigorously, the extra nitrogen will not hurt.
It is pretty easy to raise the pH by adding lime. It is much harder to lower the pH on alkaline soils. Clay needs more lime to raise the pH but it will last longer. If you are not getting good growth adding nitrogen usually helps.
