Hi Photoman509. Welcome to NGA and the PNW!
If you're on the coast, I bet you will love the climate! (Unless you are committed to growing full-size tomatoes and peppers and want them to ripen outdoors.)
>> nitrogen was very low which I know is an easy fix but the potash and phosphorus were both very high
Others know organic methods, I know chemistry. So my answer may not be a "good" one or easy to make fully safe for plants, but it's the fastest and cheapest (unless you have free compost and manure, though those do add P and K along with the N.
Also, I;m just guessing that "low N" is the problem for slow growth. Y'know, those plants don't LOOK like they have SEVERE lack of N. I would expect all-yellow lowest leaves, and some necrotic lower leaves, as the plant scavenges N from old parts to support new growth. (N is a "mobile" nutrient.) There may be other, or additional reasons for slow growth.
If you go with chemicals, which I would for the first year or two in a bed with new and questionable soil, pick one with the lowest second and third numbers, relative to the first number. But you probably know that. "N-P-K"
If you can find urea, that's most concentrated nitrogen I know of, unless you have a tank truck of ammonia handy.
It's 46% N!
"Urea (46-0-0) usually has the lowest cost per pound of nitrogen ...".
Even ammonium nitrate is only 34-0-0.
http://extension.usu.edu/files...
Urea is CO(NH2)2, and it turns to ammonia in the soil. So turn it under and/or water it in quickly, or you'll be fertilizing the wind!
Too much will burn your roots in a flash, so sprinkle THINLY and water it in and/or till under. Better, dissolve it in water and irrigate with that. Avoid spraying on leaves unless VERY VERY dilute.
You can sprinkle pellets
THINLY on the surface if you water heavily or rain enough to dissolve (more than 1/2").
And, if I were you, I would not place urea TOO close to the plants. Let it diffuse the last few inches into the root zone.
It tends to convert to ammonia and blow away if you just sprinkle on the surface.
"When a urea particle dissolves, the area around it becomes a zone of high pH and ammonia ..."
http://www.extension.umn.edu/a...
What's a safe application rate? Today I'm not finding informative sources, but once upon a time I read this:
Max recommended spread rate: to avoid burning: no more than two pounds per 1,000 sq ft.
Counting on my fingers,
2 pounds / 1,000 sq feet =
0.3 OUNCE per Square YARD =
1 gram per square FOOT
I would start with 1/4 of that. Apply and repeat, maybe once or twice a week until the condition is corrected.
THINLY! And dissolve in water first. Then water it in.
I wonder how your beds got that way? What did you make the soil from, and how recently?
It sounds quite fertile except for the low N.
I'm going to make a wild guess ... did you put a bunch of sawdust or shredded paper into that soil, and turn it under? That can create a nitrogen deficit that lasts until the microbes have eaten most of the unbalanced C that was added. Of course, microbes need N as well as C, and they can out-compete plant roots by a huge factor.
So the plants starve for N until the microbes slowly scrounge up enough N to let them digest ALL the excess C in the soil.
Hence consider using something as potent as urea or ammonium nitrate (at first).
Try multiple small feedings once or twice a week until almost all of the (theoretical) sawdust is fully decomposed. Suddenly, one day, instead of feeding the soil microbes, you'll be feeding your plants. Then, hope THAT dose was small enough not to burn the roots.
As usual, it's good to try this on a small part of one bed first. Say, dose that small corner with 2-4 times as much as you are putting on the rest of your garden. If everything in that corner suddenly looks like it caught Ebola, you know the rest of your garden is 1/2 way there, or 1/4 of the way there. Reduce the dosage to the other parts but keep feeding (slower).
And water the dead corner a lot, to wash out excess urea and ammonia and acid pH, and hope you didn't go TOO far.
Compost is safer for plant roots. Even manure is safer, especially if composted first, and low in salinity and herbicide residue and weed seeds. And they add C (organic carbon) to the soil, which is crucially necessary for soil life, unless there is WAY too much C, in which you have a nitrogen deficit that can be tricky to fix quickly.
BTW - if "cold" is the main problem, or a too-early planting-out date, you could put hoops over those pretty raised beds and cover with plastic. That'll warm them up! Or floating row covers will give some warmth. Is it practical to wrap plastic film AROUND a tomato cage?
BTW, if you put a location into "Your Profile", everyone will know whether you're on the (cool, wet) coast or (hot, dry) inland.
Click the "head-and-shoulders" icon in the upper left corner,
"Change your public profile",
"Your location"
scroll down to the bottom
"Save Your Changes".
Several of those fields appear in every forum post (upper left corner), so you can personalize your posts if you want.
The "Location" and "Your USDA hardiness zone" are the most useful ones, so people don't keep asking.
I think a "last avg frost date" and "first avg frost date" would be handy, but less often.
If you're in a part of the PNW as cool as mine, cool nights will be chilling those tomatoes' toes!
Have a good weekend!
