Fertilizing on a Schedule
To keep your plants healthy and maximize yields, you need to fertilize your garden through the growing season. The best way to keep your garden on track is to put together a plan early.
Why Do Plants Need Regular Fertilization?
Over time, as plants pull nutrients from the soil for growth and water leaches them from the ground, you need to reintroduce these elements back into the soil. Plant growth will be negatively impacted if you don’t, and your harvest may be smaller.
How Often to Fertilize Garden Vegetables?
The best way to fertilize is to create an overall schedule for your garden, with some customizations for particular circumstances, and then supplement nitrogen as plants need an extra dose.
Create a General Schedule
Most gardeners add fertilizer to the soil when preparing the planting bed. This early dose feeds seedlings for the first little bit, but they will need fertilizer again once the plants flower or hit a rapid growth spurt.
Once you start fertilizing, plan to feed the entire garden with a balanced fertilizer every three to four weeks through the growing season. Always follow the label directions, and when in doubt, it’s best to give plants less fertilizer than too much.
Plants like tomatoes and cauliflower are heavy feeders, so they need more fertilizer for growth. It may be beneficial to feed them every three weeks and the rest of the garden every four.
Create a Customized Plan
Certain vegetables have additional fertilizer requirements that require you to fine-tune your fertilization plan slightly. It’s best to research your plant types to determine if they have special needs.
- For example, tomatoes benefit from calcium supplementation through the growing season to help prevent blossom-end rot.
Add Supplemental Nitrogen as Necessary
During the growing season, some veggies need a nitrogen boost via side-dressing, which is where you incorporate fertilizer into the soil about six inches away from the plant. Standard guidelines for nitrogen supplementation include:
- Asparagus: Early spring, just before growth emerges from the ground.
- Cruciferous vegetables: Three weeks after you transplant seedlings and every three weeks following that until they crown.
- Cucumbers: One week after they flower.
- Peas and beans: After the first pods develop.
- Peppers and eggplants: After the first flowers bloom.
- Sweet corn: When plants are eight to ten inches tall and then right after tassels appear.
- Tomatoes: One to two weeks before fruit ripening and two weeks after picking the first tomato on indeterminate varieties.
