Thank you!
I believe we may have discussed this before, but I haven’t found it yet, so thank you for your patience.
I remember something about “muckiness”, and I believe I changed about half of my 10 or so containers last year as a result. I had them labeled for a while, but not now, when it matters.
Is there a suggestion for judging muckiness?
Containers sometimes contain peas winter and spring, and almost all held tomatoes or peppers (one eggplant), this year Not much I identified as disease. There were thrips, spider mites and aphids, some kind of borer in one or two that didn’t cause much damage and probably nutritional deficiencies. Fortunately I don’t typically have fungal or bacterial problems, or wilts.
Last year I mixed my own container mix from either coir or peat and perlite ( I don’t recall the proportion right now), and usually add Epsoma Garden lime at the beginning of the summer season, and granular organic fertilizer in a strip along the top, buried about two inches.
I cut off most of the vegetable plant tops in fall/winter, and pull what’s left of the roots in the spring. Winters are generally in the 50’s f during the day, 30’s-40’s at night.
Containers stay outside over winter, usually but not always covered in plastic, and this year most of the covers had holes and we had a lot of rain. They rarely if ever dry out.
There! It helped to write that out.
I’ll check pHs.
ETA Here’s the last time we discussed it! I search using “muck”!
“To this end, it may be helpful to use Actinovate on a regular basis”
So that’s why I have a box of Actinovate!