Software
Houzz Logo Print
organic_craig

top hat bluberry

16 years ago

Hi everyone! I'm new to garden web and a novice gardner,so please excuse my iggnoance..yesterday I had a little camp fire at the back of my property and remembered reading somewhere that the ashes from the oak wood is good for the garden. The mistake I made was to put a few handfulls in my bluberry top hat or is it tophat? And watered it in. Now I just realized that the ash will raise my ph and I know that blueberries prefur a more acidic soil.(oh btw its in a large container). Is there anything I can do now besides replanting it? Thanks in advance...craig

Comments (4)

  • 16 years ago

    The fastest and least expensive way to save your blueberry shrub would be to get some peat moss, and replant the shrub in new soil, amended with peat moss, which will lower pH. Any water used to irrigate this shrub should have neutral pH, or be slightly acidic, pH around 5 or 6. If you have a rain barrel, that water would be ideal for use on your blueberry shrub. It is possible to quickly lower soil pH by adding acid to the water, and drenching the soil. However, it is possible to kill the shrub this way, if you use too much acid. So this is not an acceptable method, unless you are willing to learn how to measure pH.

  • 16 years ago

    Thanks for the quick response ericwi. I do have a ph meter (the digital kind that you just dip in the water) and some acid to lower ph. I think this may be the better option only because I just replanted into a larger container a few weeks ago and now the plant is in full bloom (is it bad to transplant so soon? Will it stress the plant? Which ever you think is best I will do. I've had this plant for at least 5yrs and I tend to grow attached to my plants (like there my kids lol) and would hate to loose it.

  • 16 years ago

    Am I missing something? I don't think you have that much to worry about. Check your ph and if its too high water them with some ph adjusted water. My blueberries are in pots and I don't even check the ph on mine.

    Every 2-3 weeks I water them with Miracid For Acid Loving Plants at about 50% of the recommended dose. I give them a small drink of water just before and just after I fertilize so I donÂt shock the roots. Not sure how necessary that is but thatÂs what I do and it works for me.

    If the leaves start to get lighter in color or turn red-ish I water them with a mixture of 1 Tablespoon white vinegar to one gallon of water and that usually does the trick.

    I would just water your plants real good. No need to go crazy. Follow that by fertilizing them in a solution of water ph adjusted with white vinegar and I bet they will be fine.

  • 16 years ago

    Ok sounds good. Thanks (thisisme) you're probably right..I'm a novice grower and when I read that wood ash dramaticly raises the ph I thought my plant was done for! I seem to kill EVERYTHING and this blueberry shrub has been the longest I ever kept a plant alive..,so I'm a little attached (I know, I'm weird) anyways,thank you for the advice.I'm gonna try it now:)