Schultz Cactus Liquid Plant Food

[Gallows]

I usually use Miracle Grow for my cacti but a friend just gave me a bottle of Schultz cactus liquid plant food 2-7-7. I was just wondering if anyone has had any success with it?

[Steve Johnson]

I usually use Miracle Grow for my cacti but a friend just gave me a bottle of Schultz cactus liquid plant food 2-7-7. I was just wondering if anyone has had any success with it?

Depends on dilution rate and what the Nitrogen source is. It's helpful to evaluate ferts with that info.

[peterb]

Schultz 2-7-7 is excellent if you feed with every watering through the growing season. Miracle Grow (is that 20-20-20?) is probably better if you just feed 2 or 3 times every growing season. Either way seems to work about the same for me. The trick with cacti is to not hit them with too much nitrogen, no matter the source. I was happy with the results of using the Schultz cactus stuff.

peterb

[jnspire]

I always use Shultz 2-7-7.

It's good stuff. I usually only use it Bi- or Tri-waterly (every other or third watering) during the summer.

Almost all of my plants start to burst out some new growth as soon as I start using it.

[gemhunter178]

Same here, I get great results from it too!

[Saxicola]

Regular Miracle Grow is 24-8-16. The Tomato fertilizer is more balanced at 18-18-21. Their Bloom Booster is 15-30-15. I'd say you'd get better bang for your buck from MG (although I probably wouldn't use the All Purpose) if you dilute it. I'm assuming the source of N is the same in each. If not that could affect things slightly.

[Steve Johnson]

I spent a lot of time on the Cultivation forum looking at ferts, and it took awhile to figure out what I believe is the best way to go. My starting point was correspondence with Darryl at CoronaCactus nursery, who recommended Dyna-Gro All Pro 7-7-7. This led to a very interesting thread where Ian provided some much-needed education on the issue:

http://www.cactiguide.com/forum/viewtop ... 25&t=24810" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Ian really knows his stuff, and I don't know if you have seen such an in-depth examination of this elsewhere on the forum. I can't pretend that any particular fert is "the" answer for everyone, but there's nothing wrong with getting as well informed as possible. Hopefully the thread I'm linking to here can shed some additional light on the subject.

[RayC]

I have used Shultz on my outdoor plants on occasion (if its dry long enough to consider watering).
Right now I have Miracle grow liquid cacti and Succulent . have no idea if its any good
n 2% 1.6%urea .4%ammoniacal
p 7%
k 7%
plus trace boron,copper,ir0n, manganese,zinc

[Steve Johnson]

I have used Shultz on my outdoor plants on occasion (if its dry long enough to consider watering).
Right now I have Miracle grow liquid cacti and Succulent . have no idea if its any good
n 2% 1.6%urea .4%ammoniacal
p 7%
k 7%
plus trace boron,copper,ir0n, manganese,zinc

Well, I'm a long way from being an expert, but I know more about ferts now than I did 3 months ago, so let me take a stab at it (so to speak)...

N 2% -- too low, plus most of it being Urea means that it takes a long time to act on the roots. I'll compare this with my Dyna-Gro 7-7-7. 4.9% is Nitrate and 2.1% is Ammoniacal Nitrogen, for a total of 7%. Both sources of N act quickly, although Ammoniacal is a little slower.
P @ 7% and K @ 7% -- sounds good if you have a proper balance with 7% N. People have different opinions on whether NPK should be balanced or the P and K should be higher. I don't have enough knowledge on water chemistry or plant physiology to challenge those opinions, so I'll leave it up to others. As to my semi-educated guess, I don't think you'd go wrong with relatively balanced NPK numbers.

Let me get into some technical details if you wouldn't mind. Before I continue, I should mention that Ian provided me with some valuable information, which I linked to in my post above. What I'm about to say comes directly from him, so I'm passing this along for the benefit of those who will find it useful. (Whatever Ian's background is, it's impressive and he constantly blows me away.) I'll also mention that we're talking about potted cacti. If your cacti are in the ground, sorry, but I have no experience with it.

People are often concerned about over-fertilizing, and for justifiable reason. However, it depends entirely on understanding the control you have over nutrient delivery to your cacti. We'll go through some numbers. If you dilute 1 tsp. of a 7-7-7 fert in 1 gallon of water, you'll get 91 parts per million (PPM) for each of the 3 primary nutrients (Ian helped me with the math). And why the heck does PPM matter? Because it gives you the precise amount of NPK being delivered to cacti through their roots. That in turn will tell you if they're getting enough, not enough, or too much -- N probably being the most critical. I cite N specifically because of its different possible sources. With 91 PPM for total N through Nitrate and Ammoniacal N, cacti will be getting an immediate benefit unlike Urea. You'll see this with nutrient-deprived cacti which start greening often in a matter of days. However, Nitrate and Ammoniacal N will be gone by the time of next watering, which is why fertilizing should be done fairly often during the growing season.

Here's where N sources and PPM need to be considered in terms of fert frequency. Personally, I'm not interested in joining the Urea-free cult, but I have no problem with anyone who prefers to use Urea-based ferts. It's just that I have no experience with it, so I'll confine myself to discussing the fert I am using. There is some indication that 91 PPM of N may be a little too high, so there's nothing wrong about erring on the side of caution by going a little lower. I believe the goal is to keep the source of N at a fairly constant rate, instead of giving your cacti a big head rush once every couple of months while they don't get any N the rest of the time. (Sounds like the cactus equivalent of manic depression!) With that said, a properly diluted fert doesn't need to be done at every single watering. I don't know of any hard-and-fast rules about this, so I think you'll have to go by intuitive feel. Just watch out for plants that look overly lush and flabby without good spination. If you see it happen, you went too far, and you should hold back on the fert for awhile. Persistent mild over-fertilization is a potential problem, although it'll take years to manifest. This is because fertilizing over time will lead to salt buildup in the soil. It helps to flush your potting medium occasionally. Rainwater is excellent, or you can use distilled water, but water only -- no fert! (The lime in hard water can also lead to salt buildup. This is an entirely different problem, although it can be addressed through acidification of tap/well water. You can find discussions of the issue elsewhere on the Cultivation forum.)

Hopefully this gives you a thorough rundown on the situation. I'll leave you with one basic rule about ferts -- it's better to under-fertilize than overdo it. Luckily cacti are resilient, so as long as you don't make any huge mistakes, they should be able to recover from any minor ones you make. Cultivating is the art of observation, and observant cactus aficionados should do well.

If anyone finds that I'm making factual errors, it's certainly not my intention, so please by all means feel free to correct me!

[iann]

"most of it being Urea means that it takes a long time to act on the roots" and yet "keep the source of N at a fairly constant rate, instead of giving your cacti a big head rush once every couple of month". Sounds like Urea would be perfect while nitrate would just be a big head rush?

[tumamoc]

Has anyone tried Eleanor's VF11? It has an NPK ratio of 0.15-0.85-0.55. It seems like cacti would like it. I dunno.

[JeffWhiteDevil]

I usually use Miracle Grow for my cacti but a friend just gave me a bottle of Schultz cactus liquid plant food 2-7-7. I was just wondering if anyone has had any success with it?

I have used Schultz Liquid ‘cactus’ Plant Food with good results.