Greenhouses are good

You have to understand that plant vendors prep the plants to look their best so we'll buy them. Greenhouses and fertilization probably play a role in that. They are also put on display to sell when they are at the peak of bloom. Most plants will want a little rest after a huge bloom.

Pam

The Growers are the people who fertilize. We use plain old city of Houston Water at the nursery where I work.

Nope, not all nurseries fertilize their plants or even make sure they are adequately watered. I've worked at three nurseries & the one I work for now (The Natural Gardener in Austin) is the only one that has adequately cared for their plants.

Pkponder's got the right answer to your question, And here's my expansion of that...

Many growers use greenhouses & timed applications of different growth hormones & other chemicals to be able to deliver young plants at peak bloom, most times unnaturally so (Remember those tables of three-inch-tall petunias with eight blooms apiece? Ever been able to do that yourself, or known another average gardener who can? I sure can't.). Once the plants leave the grower's care, they start to decline, much like a drug addict going through withdrawal.

Most nurseries only order enough plants to sell right away, before they crash, & many of those nurseries don't do much in the way of plant care to try to avoid that crash or atleast lessen it (think WalMart). If they don't sell before they crash, they'll just cut the price to get rid of them before they get any worse &/or die from lack of care. So at these nurseries, you're buying plants that are stressed to the max, sometimes past the point of no return.

The trick is to find those nurseries that try to buy plants that aren't forced so much & who then go on to care for the plants so that they aren't as stressed & don't crash a week after you get them home. These are usually the nurseries not attached to a big box store. There surely are independent nurseries who treat plants like furniture & there are a few Home Depots lucky enough to have a knowledgeable gardener working in their nursery, but by & large it's the other way around.

One last thing - I don't want to give anyone the impression that I'm blaming the nursery workers. They're usually overworked & given very little instruction so either don't know how to correctly water & fertilize or don't have time. A few figures to demonstrate that point:
-- First nursery I worked for (small independent roadside stand) - 4000 square feet of plants & three employees responsible for customer & plant care, including the owner who wasn't there much
-- Second nursery I worked for (big box store) - 10,000 square feet of plants & 4 employees responsible for customer & plant care, including the nursery manager
-- Nursery where I work now - 20,000 square feet of plants & **30** or so employees directly responsible for customer & plant care, *not* including our managers or "support staff" (horticulturist, botanist, John Dromgoole himself, etc.). And I still work my butt off. Literally. I've lost five pants sizes in the four months I've worked there.

They usually use Osmocote or Nutricote (or is that Multicote?) beginning in the spring from WHOLESALE nursery. I don't think retail nurseries do that stuff unless they grow their own or repot them to larger containers. All retail nurseries have to do is water to keep them alive.

My favorites nursery owner (small independant whose livelihood depends upon selling those plants) told me that they water their small annuals daily with water soluable fertilizer when it's hot and dry. Told me that Peters 20-20-20 was close to what they use, but that their's is for commercial use. They water from a 50 gallon watering can!

I'm going to work in a nursery. 5 pants sizes!! That's better than the stress diet.
Tally HO!

Cynthianovak, they fertilized DAILY? I wonder if the fertilizer was diluted since it was so often?