define seedlings ...how big ... and into what?,... for how long

ken

Most just developed their first true leaves/needles. Only an inch or two tall. I will be putting them into 3 inch containers. I only plan to keep them in those pots until it is time to pot them up once again.

Personally, I have not had good luck with Al's Gritty Mix 1:1:1, and I'm certain I did it right, screened properly, ect. My problem with that mix is you have to be a slave to watering, literally everyday it seems dry. As a test, I did 50/50 of my Acer seedlings in Al's Gritty Mix and the rest in Peat/Perlite. Basically all of them in the gritty mix dried out and failed, except 1, and it's way behind those in the peat/perlite mix in terms of growth, just barley leafed out. I only had 1 loss in the peat/perlite mix.

At that size, I'd stick with the peat/perlite for one more season, but in individual pots, then next year, up them to band pots using Al's 5:1:1 mix, which is much better at retaining moister, while still allowing good aeration, ect.

Right^.. We usually here-and I all the time-admonish folks to not place too much stock on their landscape plants "needing" fertilizer. But as sc77 correctly points out, in potted plants, especially those in soilless mixes, which is all of them these days-there are basically no nutrients. Once in the ground, another story altogether.

im wondering if first true leaf conifers.. really need to be potted up???

and true dat ... if your media... allows water to run out the bottom ... then fert needs to be put back in the top ...

but even with that.. being trees ... i wouldnt get all that carried away with it ... maybe once a month.. just enough balanced water sol fert to barely turn the water a color ... and just water it in ... and let it flo out the bottom ...

see pic below.. for a rather cheap way i potted up some rooted conifers ...[if i can find it .. i did.. go figure] ...used a fresh razor to cut slits in the bottom for drainage ... and thats just your typical promix type stuff ... pre moistened ... and they were kept rather dry ...

after tranplant stress.. just never forget.. they are trees ... not water hungry annuals or perennials ... and BTW... they were never in sun ... very broght shade ... full sun was inches away ...

i think you might be trying to love them to death ... this might be better to do.. in fall

ken

ps: finding the tote will be the hard part ... lol.... and.. the base problem with als recipes.. is that you end up with a truck load.. lol ...

notice the water leaking out the bottom after watering ....

One of the truisms with plants is that of their apparent liking for spoon-feeding, whereby tiny doses of nutrients are supplied, but on a continual basis. I might reach for that sort of thing-a very dilute solution, but supplied with every watering. Either way, you're going to likely succeed.

i keep a gallon milk jug around ... very dilute.. like i said.. barely makes the water blue ... and once in a while.. after i water with the galvanized watering can .... i use the indoor watering can and give each pot a slurp ...

very dilute.. it can be more often.. than full strength ... but i still maintain ... they dont need all that much.. they are trees.. not children ...

ken

Promix works fine. I use it for everything. There isn't fertilizer in it so choose what you like. For me a generic bag of time release fertilizer does a fine job.

Dax

Thanks for the input everyone. I don't feel like "Al's mix or bust" anymore. I will probably go with the promix, if I can find it, and if not, the peat/perlite.

Kyle, I don't know how much you perused that "Al's gritty mix" thread, but wondering if you saw where I had the gall to simply suggest that certain aspects of that theory don't matter so much in containerized growing where the plants are not going to be in those containers year to year? Man, did I upset their little apple cart! I literally got hazed off that forum! And the kicker-I was not speaking hypothetically but rather, about plantings I've done for decades now in my work, which plantings have been wildly successful. I had every armchair psychoanalyst coming at me! It quickly became time to move on. You think I get into it with folks here? There is NO room for conflicting viewpoints on the containers forum!

I saw that, Tom. It was a little frightening lol. That's why I decided to just come ask my friendly pals here on this forum.

For someone who has little experience (like myself), they will make you think Al's mix is the only way. Luckily, I have you all here on this forum, and the common sense to know there's basically always more than one solution to an issue.

My only problem with that little ruckus is that I'm so poor at documenting via photos. Had I simply had a slide to show them-of annual plantings billowing out from the big containers, glorious colors, green, super-healthy plants, blah blah. But I'm a slacker when it comes to taking photos, so had nothing really to shut them up with! It would have worked in an instant. And when I mentioned that in this system-with our limited opportunities to water these things, we actually use some field soil-gasp-in our mix....I thought they might reach through the wires of the internet to try to choke me!

Hows that for a comparison... Gritty on the left, peat/perlite on right... Treated exactly the same, same age, same everything. I think most of the gritty mix ones are dead

To recap what I tried to explain in that ill-fated post over in "Containers...", it is specifically where plants are to remain in their containers over the long haul-more than a single year-where the need becomes paramount of a mix that won't break down, won't settle, etc. That is where Al's gritty thing comes into play. Since these little guys by no means are intended to stay in those starter pots, all of that goes away.

Of course, try telling the peeps on that other forum that. It was as if I'd insulted their moms!

Yea Tom, I dunno. I think I would take it a step further. Unless you are able to consistently water your plants on an almost daily basis, I can't see the true gritty mix working out too well. I overwintered those Japanese maple seedlings in my garage, and they obviously didn't need much moister as they were dormant... but the gritty mix simply holds very little moister, so when I did water it didn't retain enough moister. I know those seedlings died of thirst.

I tried using the gritty mix for seedlings too and that was a disaster. Peat/Perlite is definitely king for seedlings, and the Al's 5:1:1 is good for longer term potted plants. I'm just not sure of many applications that would work well with the gritty mix. But the 5:1:1 doesn't seem like a unique creation, it's basically what all the good nurseries use for their mail order conifers. The understock abies I received from Jason Hupp were basically in a 5:1:1 mix, and they did great.

Interesting. Thanks for the support, lol! I couldn't believe it when people started questioning the way I worded things and so on. What an online nightmare.......on a little gardening board!