I have been saving egg shells and banana peels for creating "organic " fertilizer. It is my understanding the drying and pulverizing these will add calcium, magnesium and phosphorus to the soil. I have ground all toa fine powder and was wondering when it would be best to sprinkel this under my fruit trees. Because this contains little or no nitrogen I am assuming now would not be a problem as it should not cause early start for dormant trees. Also, in this form release to the soil in a usable form will take some time. Can I add now or should I wait until last frost has passed? I usually fertilize then with 8-8-8 but though these “naturals” would give a bit of a jump start for blossom and fruit production.
You can apply that now. In your zone things will be growing soon. And like you say there isn’t much to leach away. Waiting a month or two won’t be wrong either.
Thanks!
I used to believe in magical ingredients that have super powers in favoring healthy growth of plants. Now I think more about good drainage, adequate nitrogen, and moderate organic matter content in soil to help assure a thriving microbiotic community there.
Most of my compost goes to my vegetable garden, I don’t “waste” it on fruit trees anymore. They can usually fend for themselves and get what they need from average soil as long as you account for what you remove when you harvest.
In most soils, the only nutrient trees usually respond to is nitrogen, which can improve the quality of fruit in moderate doses in spring, and damage the quality in excessive doses later. Generously applied, it can speed the establishment of fruit trees and accelerate the time to your first meaningful harvest.
It is a rare soil that doesn’t contain adequate P, and adequate seems to be much less than typical guidelines. Mychorizal relationships render deficiencies to a rare occurrence.
At any rate, routine fertilization with “balanced” fertilizer has the potential of doing harm over time if you fail to monitor what is happening through soil testing. Excess P from over application is much more common than P deficiency in fruit trees- at least in my region.
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