Don't Feed Plants - Learn to fertilize correctly 

My grandfather always told me the same thing you just said in this video about this stuff and he was an uneducated man that couldn't read and write quit school in third grade and started doing this type of work when he was 11 years old until the day he died at 85 he always told me always concern yourself more about feeding your soil than feeding your plants and most of the time everything else will take care of itself. I don't remember Grandpa ever using a whole lot of fertilizer on anything he planted he always concerned hiself with healthy soil.

Finally someone that talks sense. All videos I've watched refers to feeding plants and nothing about testing the soil and treating it. Thank you so much.

Love it. Basics, no bs, low-maintenance results. Takes a few years til you realize most growing info is really Marketing of Ag products. "Myths" is the kind way to describe it. *I missed out on being tutored by my grandmother reputed to be able to grow anything. You've made up for that loss in spades. Bless You.🍒

I am a master gardener in my county. I don't know how many people I talk to that say that they put all kinds of stuff in their soil thinking that it will improve their crops. They say they put epsom salts, egg shells, bone meal, gypsum, rock phosphate, lime, coffee grounds, compost tea and many others additives believing they soil turns into gold. I ask them if they had their soil tested. I have yet to have one person answer, "Yes." When I suggest they have it tested for $15, not one person, so far, has been interested. In the end I have to tell them that I have no idea what their soil is like.

Absolutely pumped for the awareness on synthetic vs organic. The pictures of your garden really bring it home your experience with something so close to nature

EXCELLENT video! Thank you so much for great education.

Thank you for educating me - the most common sensible & science based advice in the industry - good stuff, cheers, Arno

Thank you for this incredibly informative video. Your garden shots are beautiful. I'm also very grateful to hear your thoughts on container gardening in this video. I live in a city, and I have no outdoor space, so container gardening is what I do. I especially appreciate the points you make about organic vs. synthetic fertilizers. Peace.

With the abundance of clean rain. Everything is growing perfectly.

Thank you Robert. ❄️💚🙃

Very impressive video.

THANKS FOR THE THIS INFORMATION.

I love all of your gardening advice. From my understanding it's 100% accurate and I appreciate you. I don't know if I missed you mentioning the the pH of the soil also could affect uptakes of nutrients

Thanks you for this toturial

UR awesome. Makes so much sense. Thank you.

Wow these videos are great. Its only my second season and i have a lot to learn still but im trying to get the 80:20 ratio in order. Thanks, and good luck with the channel

The thing is that, unless your garden is quite big, the cost of LAB analyses is higher than fertilizers cost

Your videos are very informative. Could you do a video on lawns or fertilizers for lawns? I’m in Minnesota. On one part of my property where my house is built they dug the hole for my house and spread feet deep of clay right over the soil from the ice age. On the back half is the original soil from the ice age since very deep level of dirt. I have perhaps 2-4 inches of dirt building up on the newer lawn because I never bag. Much appreciated.

I shredded a bunch of my kitchen scraps that I normally toss on the compost and instead tossed it on a garden bed. That bed has the most worms right now.

Very sensible approach , great video i like how he doesnt make all outragous claims of all organic power synthetic fertilizer is more readily avalable to plants than organic.

I think the number one mistake that home gardeners make is they do not correct pH. In the vegetable slot of 6.2-6.8 most vegetables will properly respirate AND the plant will be able to properly lift all the minerals it needs. Most soils unless overworked have most of the nutrients needed by plants. Even soil testing should be done when the pH is in the vegetable slot.

As has been consistent on your presentations, true accurate SCIENCE based information and none of the mythical-quasi-pseudo science that abounds in so many online communities and I’m constantly amazed by some of the “stuff” people believe to be true without any scientific evidence to be found. Thanks Robert!

This is such great advice. Love your factual common sense scientific approach to gardening. Just curious I keep reading feed your banana plants lots of nitrogen cause they need as much as you can supply. Is that true or is like what you say if the nutrient is already in the soil you don’t need to add more?

10:39 *_Miracle-Gro Water Soluble All Purpose Plant Food_* costs 1/2 to 1/3 and is essentially the same formula with the same ingredients. Compare labels and you will see.

👍👍👍Thank you

Thank you for these videos and your books. I'm an Arborist and seed collector who is getting into propagating native Woody plants mostly trees. I'm wondering if you could recommend some basic chemistry and organic chemistry books that would help me with fundamental knowledge. School is not in my cards right now. I have a large library of books but would like to have a good base of the fundamentals. Thanks

Is leaf mold good for establishing newly created landscaping beds, all things being equal? What about leaf mulch in combination with municipal compost?

I grow fruit and vegetables not lawn but I wound up buying lawn fertilizer for my fruit trees for the first 2 years. It was 24-0-0.

Just about done your new book - excellent again- what’s the next one about?

I used the Dyna Gro Bloom product for many years in my hydroponic gardening; for which that product was designed to be used. In hydroponic gardening you have to supply all of the nutrients because there is no soil. Dyna Gro was not trying to con ignorant customers with that product. The products that tell customers to use the Bloom products in soil are misleading ignorant customers.

Should lime be used with fertilizers? How is the lime applied in planting beds and lawns? Enjoy every video you produce.

I have been meaning to ask you this question for some time, does the fact that plants are taking up nutrients in a ratio of 3-1-2 apply directly to the label on a bag of fertilizer or should we be factoring in that the P and K are actually giving you less P and K than the label suggests? Klaus

the only thing i add to my garden is urine. in the summer,whenever i need to take a leak i piss in the soil of my plants. they also get water this way. many think its nasty but its all chemistry!

Fertilizing with nitrogen will always stimulate growth beyond what there would otherwise be. Adding the other two along with it will never hurt. If the plant doesn’t need it, so be it. A little fertilizer is a hell of a lot cheaper than ‘lab tests’ on your soil.

If you have high calcium soils, shouldn’t you supplement with phosphorus even if you are not deficient?

How about sandy soil, is it necessary to fertiilize? Thank you.

How does one find a suitable soil testing lab? I was looking into it before I watched your video but I only found environmental/builder soil testing. Are there any keywords or search terms the would narrow it down?

Guess what I'm doing.....I'm feeding my slugs.

I'm getting ready to purchase some soil to fill new raised beds. I'm planning to buy a planter's mix, which is 60% topsoil and 40% compost. Would it be better to just buy topsoil? Will this mix have too much phosphate?

How many degrees there? Iam arabian is so heat. 34°/48° . Thank you😊

I know there’s something wrong with my soil. I’m getting it tested as soon as the ground isn’t frozen solid anymore.❄️💚🙃

please, make a simple diy tutorial how to compost for newcomers

What ph soil do weeds like most ?

👍👍

One thing you can do with deficiency testes look at which leaves are deficient, I do believe understanding if it’s new growth or old growth can help you identify the problem of something like iron deficiency

Where does one get their soil tested?

I don't eat at all I just let my throat receive the nutrients.

Sir . I can't download your free ebook help me

Nice video! Do you have some opinion about JADAM organic farming?

Hi Robert, I had posted this on the blog but not sure it made it. In Plant Science you describe auxin as a prohibitive chemical and I notice in Botany for Gardeners that Brian Capon describes it as the stimulant for growth. Am I splitting hair? Just curious about the possible difference. Thanks as always for great information!

What about having a soil biology test too?👍🏻

I let the plants feed themselves 😊

Thanks for the information. It's been a struggle for me--why "add" fertilizers? We ate decently before Big Pharma, which represents more, faster and cheaper regardless of outcome.

This is like how I don't feed my family, I just replace the nutrients that are missing from their plates.

Soil everywhere has all the nutrients needed within it. It's the microorganisms capable of breaking them down into an edible source for the plant that you must cultivate. When you simply replace the nutrient rather than the organism that breaks the soil down into the nutrient, you end up with a dead soil that always relies on chemical inputs. Once the plant consumed what you added, it's gone. This is the philosophy behind no-till gardening, though some fall into the dogma of it like it's a political statement. It's not (till when absolutely necessary). It takes time to build the right soil organisms, so I'm not saying don't use inputs. Use as needed to keep your plants healthy but with the goal of not needing them the following year. The nutrients will come with the life balance. To learn about how to do this, look up "living soil."

So you Are saying we should everytime pay for expensive lab tests ? Before planting then before harvest. I have few garden locations so i should pay for few tests at the same time? How did then 100 years ago people Had such a Big fruits without Labs? I know you Are on the Point but i think it is cheaper to add some soil and compost after harvest. Who Said that some Plant will Die Because it needs less P From NPK or K ? IF your theory Is correct why the market GMO food Is not tasty ? Why it Has bigger and smaller fruits ? My fruits Are Also some Big some small but tasty. Whats the Point of Been perfect fertilized? Whats the physical proof or Point of perfect fertilization? More fruits? But i also have much fruits

It’s remarkable how much misinformation is contained in this video. The premise that we “ never feed plants” completely ignores the science of foliar feeding. The idea that the only way to determine deficiencies is through soil testing ignores plant sap analysis, which is the far better option for determining deficiencies and toxicities. It’s like taking a blood test for the plant instead of testing the nutrient content in the plants diet ( which cannot determine nutrient uptake). Advancing Eco Agriculture has pioneered the strategy of fixing soil imbalances through targeted foliar feeding of crops informed by data from plant sap analysis, all while growing a crop. ( I’m not recommending this for home gardeners as it is simply not economical on such small scales, just pointing to the fact that feeding plants is valid). Another bit of misinformation is the assertion that organic fertilizers always take a long time to break down and therefore aren’t ideal to be used in container gardening. Organic, water soluble fertilizers are easily produced with a little knowhow. Readily available nitrogen can be sourced from fermenting fish in brown sugar to make Readily available fish amino acids called FAA, Urine provides readily available N and K, as well as micro nutrients. Finished compost has both immediately available, and slow release fertilizer value and can be top dressed into potted plants. Water soluble potassium can be made by pyrolizing plant materials with a high K content, (sunflower stalks are the go to in Korean natural farming) and then soaking the resulting charcoal in water to dissolve the K into solution, and finally, water soluble fertilizer can be made by rotting biomass down in water as has been done in Korea for thousands of years. These aren’t one size fits all, easy fixes, but rather adaptive methodologies that must be fine tuned to each growers specific context, but the can make for extremely low budget, highly productive, and ecologically sustainable gardening. I would encourage folks to check out JADAM for a complete system of low budget, ecological agriculture.

Your idea of 'don't fertilize unless tested for deficiency' sounds great & wise, but it really fails in actual practice. Those tests for deficiency are deficient themselves. They are not tuned to maximum growth, but very, very far from it. I hate to say this, it sounds terrible, but in real life it is true that any average schlub using a cheap fertilizer like Miracle Gro per instructions will far outgrow you using your testing-for-deficiency method

If you aren't feeding plants, why do foliar sprays work? Or do they?