The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Growing => Fruit => Topic started by: suziequeue on August 22, 2014, 06:21:07 pm
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As of now I am going to be more organised about feeding and mulching our fruit trees and bushes. The RHS website (https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?PID=539#section-2)is very helpful on the mulch bit but I am confused by the feeding advice bit.
For apple trees it says "sprinkle the fertiliser around the tree's rooting area".
So - do I scatter granules on the ground and then mulch over it? - which is OK for the small trees but is going to be a problem for the larger trees. Also - the chickens will eat/scratch the granules if I just scatter them in the grass around the rooting area of the big old Bramleys……
Could I just water in a liquid fertiliser?
It mentions using Epsom Salts as a foliar spray which - again - won't be a problem with the smaller trees and bushes and fruit bushes (we do have a low magnesium problem here as we are on heavy clay soil) but will be a problem with the big old Bramleys.
What do other people do?
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All my fruit trees get a mulch with goat muck every winter, and I also sprinkle some SEER rock dust around all of them (underneath the muck). It has worked well enough for the apple trees, and now have had the first plum harvest this year too!
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I scattered and then mulched last season (actually under a mulch mat but they're all crap!). With the big old Bramleys I don't bother - I reckon if they've been there 80 years and are still thriving, their roots are finding something I can't tap! Same for foliar spray - we also have low magnesium and will have to spray the vineyard routinely. We scattered kieserite when we first planted but clearly not that effective because we already have some leaves showing signs of low magnesium so we'll be routinely spraying the vines and baby fruit trees next season but won't bother with the big trees.
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I just stuck my stuff into the ground and let it get on with it. Only disaster has been the mulberries. One I pkated where it's too exposed and doesn't like it and the other has just died despite remedial care with water and feed - and I don't know why.
All the other trees grow like mad around here so it didn;t seem worth going to extra effort..and there's more than enough apples than I can eat anyway.
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I don't spray leaves unless there's a problem, not routinely. Couldn't cover my big old Bramleys either so I don't.
Mulch I am putting on at the moment, the hens do root around in it so I just heap it around the orchard and let them do the scattering :) I usually put my wood ash out in winter for them too, it's usually rained in before the hens get chance to dustbath but if they do then it works for them and the trees get the goodness eventually.
I'm thinking of adding a layer of dead leaves this year since I had a couple of sycamores cut down and just finished taking the heaps apart to lop firewood from twigs and make a leaf pile. If I could stop the amount of weeds and grass that now grow over the old black weedmatting, I'd put more down but they just love the mulch too ::)