none ...

they simply dont need it ...

what do you mean by contractor ... is he a home builder.. or a plantsman???

have you ever had a soil test done???

ken

I definitely wouldn't fertilize them this year. Roots will growing in nutrient rich soil tend to stay in place. Roots seeking nutrients spread out. At this point, you need them to spread their roots as far and as fast as possible for future drought resistance.

Hi Ken.

I had the trees planted by a landscaper. He said the foliage wasn't as green as he would like. He suggested a General Purpose fertilizer like what would be used on Azaleas. But he's no expert on it. So he suggest I ask for help. I've never had a soil test. But I have 4 arborvitaes in the same area the new ones were planted in and they are doing really well. Even after our very hot weather here in the Pacific NW this summer. What do you think of Liquid Miracle Gro for Azaleas to be applied now to green up the foliage?

Thanks.

Sharon

It depends entirely on whether or not this particular planting on this particular site needs some nutrient supplementation at this particular time - there is no advantage to denying plants soil minerals, whether they are conifers/trees or not. Maybe you should sample your soil and have it analyzed - nobody here will know which nutrients, if any your planting may need to have added. Which product to use depends on what it supplies and how much of it, relative to what may be needed.

Chances are, if you are in the same region as me the conifers are deficient in nitrogen. Especially if they were not kept adequately fertilized at the sales yard - a common occurrence - before being purchased for installation on your property.

Are you mistaking flagging for lack of green? That's when the old foliage turns brown before falling off in the Fall.

Mike

Odds are these are 'Smaragd', which shouldn't be showing dead foliage on the outside.

Mike & Embothrium. No Flagging. Just not as much foliage or as vibrant as the landscaper thought they should have. The trees were planted mid-June of this year.

Thanks. Sharon

Yep, the plants should never have been installed. A professional should know better. He's getting paid to make those decisions.

Mike

When I installed a 'Smaragd' hedge for a customer near here I drove way out into the countryside of another county to get suitable stock, which was dug to order.

You might say you , 'went the extra mile'. :-)

Mike

Luckily the hedge wasn't a mile long. As it was I ended up with quite a load. And she wanted me to sign an agreement saying I would replace any failures.

Did you? :-)

Mike

Hi Mike, I used Miracle Gro for Azaleas, Rodie's, etc. for its' high content of iron. Easy to use. Hope it works. Thanks. Sharon

[Yes, she was insistent that I guarantee the plants. Apparently there were no failures as I never heard anything].

Iron deficiency is unlikely in this region, products with chelated iron in them are useful primarily where soils are alkaline - you should never apply chemicals to your soil without having some specific information that these are called for. Usually only nitrogen needs to be supplemented on local soils, except on the outer coast where phosphorus may sometimes also be lacking.

What's more, Thuja are calciphiles, the exact opposite of Rhodies, Azalea, etc. They don't require a highly-acidic soil environment, making their best growth in regions having significant soil calcium and magnesium. I don't know why this factoid is not more generally known.....all plants, just because they happen to have cones, are not alike.

Now I would like to address Embothrium's statement that soils in the PNW tend to be N-deficient. In actuality, soils the world over tend to be at least somewhat N-limited. The proof of this is simple: Fertilize with a nitrogen fertilizer and you will see a growth response. This is misleading in terms of it indicating that something "needs" to be applied to that soil. All forests, the world over, have surprisingly low N levels. But it is the slow, steady trickle of this and other nutrients, mostly supplied via mycorrhizal fungal associates in the soil, that delivers tiny amounts of these nutrients, but at a steady pace. This, rather than a human coming along and dumping large amounts of nutrients on top of the soil, is what forest trees like. The proof, again, is the widespread green color of vegetation all over the planet. So, if you analyzed a typical forest soil, results would show a "shortage" of perhaps N, perhaps P (phosphates) but the plants nevertheless may be perfectly healthy. This could not be more different than the simple paradigms of say, growing corn. Far, far more complex webs of living and non-living things in the soil are what a healthy forest has. And by adding nutrients via fertilization, one of the first things that is destroyed in that process is these mycorhhizal fungi. I'd take the slow, steady approach, even if your yard is not a forest. It more closely mimics the way nature works, and even such mundane items as woodchip mulch, fallen leaves, and especially, sloughed-off root parts as the plants cycle and recycle through the growing season, are where these goodies come from.

+oM

N tends to be limited because it is the most mobile of the basic plant nutrients and doesn't remain in situ for any length of time. It is rapidly volatized, mineralized and leached out of existing soil conditions and tends to be consumed/processed more by soil organisms than other plant nutrients. That's why few professional soil tests will show readings for N - too difficult to test for and with meaningless results anyway - so N is almost always advised to be added. Doesn't really matter where on the planet one is located :-) And tom's recommendation on how to achieve this addition of N is entirely appropriate.

And iron chlorosis is just as common here in the PNW as it can be elsewhere (although this really has no bearing on the OP's issue). One doesn't need to have alkaline soils to develop iron chlorosis - only soils that are not sufficiently acidic enough for the preferences of the plants growing in them.

Righto^. Another way to think about soil N is that of low-maintenance turf, say in an old park in town. Probably, nobody ever fertilizes this turf, yet, aside from during drought conditions, it is likely as green as just about any other turf in town, save for those fanatics that equate a fluorescent green lawn with...I don't even kn ow! So what the heck is going on? First, as I alluded to above, root systems of plants are mostly not permanent structures. Especially the feeder roots, those up[-turned guys just under the soil surface, are generated by the plant-and then sloughed off-numerous times during the growing season. This adds to the organic matter content of a soil where probably most of the fall leaves are removed yearly, etc. So by constantly generating, dying, then regenerating, much material is added to the soil, and this is biologically active material. Hence, a pretty good growth pattern despite minimal to no inputs by humans. The trees in said park are also doing the same exact thing-living, growing and dying root parts all through the growing season. It's an active process, not at all what one might think by viewing a stationary root at the base of a big tree. All in all, this and related factors are why reasonably decent turf-and other plant communities-can do pretty sell with minimal if any fertilization.

+oM

In a lot of cases too much introduced nitrogen results in fast, tender, weak growth. The kind bugs like.

Mike

Yup, that too. And please dear reader, be aware I've made every mistake in the book. I remember at one time, perhaps right around 1990, walking down our main commercial strip with a cyclone fertilizer spreader strapped to my shoulders, flinging urea-yes, straight urea, all around trees in wells! I cringe at the imbecility of it all. Now those trees surely had their challenges. But what I was doing was just stupid1

+oM

Developed properties where most new plantings are located are no longer receiving the benefit of forest soil conditions. Especially where people are watering the nitrogen can become quite deficient. For the same reason much stock that has been in frequently watered sales yards for a time can be quite in need of a boost.

With this area now being included within the realm of serious acidic precipitation soils not being acid enough for acid loving plants seems unlikely to be a routine occurrence. The local rhododendron society was recommending applications of dolomite to counter the effects of excessive soil acidity by the 1970s.

Interesting, that bit about needing lime for the acidophiles. And surely, you've got a valid point as to new nursery stock (new to the end-user), and stripped out soils in our wonderful modern developments. I was remiss in not mentioning those areas. I'd still go "low (rate) and slow (frequency)" in most cases of woody plant establishment, unless that soil test that pretty much no one ever does indicated a serious need. That's certainly not an indictment of doing soil tests-it's always a good practice if there is any degree of uncertainty, but more a reflection of what I've mostly seen. And this being the conifer forum, it might be appropriate to repeat what many of us already know-that for the most part, these plants have lower nutrient needs than angiosperms. Even there, I will admit to the existence of "luxuriant consumption", a sort of force-feeding of plants whereby growth can be enhanced beyond the baseline. This can actually do some good in some cases with potassium. But more generally, this can also get you into the trouble Mike describes, that of high-nutrition-value foliage and shoots attracting extra attention from insects, pathogens, etc. It's a balance, and very nuanced one at that, so if I can accomplish anything here, it would be to cast some shade (buh dum bum) on the knee-jerk reaction that fertilizer is always the answer to any perceived or real plant performance problem. Too much of that still going on, and the questions of some good people who happen to not be plant growth experts on this forum and elsewhere supports that fact.

+om

One can overdose on medications, too. Telling others trees or conifers never need fertilizer, or nitrogen applications are inherently detrimental, and so on are bum steers. No matter how much people love to generalize and simplify a particular approach (or recommendation) either fits a specific situation or it doesn't. Here in the PNW nitrogen deficiencies on cultivated (gardened, landscaped, or otherwise no longer naturally vegetated) soils are known to be frequent, so when a planting is thought to be less green than it should there is a good likelihood of applications of the correct amounts of nitrogen at suitable times producing an improvement.