Wow ... I do love this thread ...
I honestly believe from my own experience that when one is growing roses in less than ideal conditions, s/he is forced to learn about the roses themselves and what they need to thrive. It's also necessary to understand soil and how it works to feed the plant.
I'll just share a few things I have learned these last years growing roses in a place where nothing has ever grown before. Not even weeds ...
The soil was dead.
I, too am gardening in what we call glacier slurry. For me, the soil is tightly compressed rocks, no larger than my fist, with small bits of sandy clay in the crevices between the rocks. Added to that, the soil on the house pad is subsoil because the house pad was cut out of a slope. In essence, there was NO organic material in my "soil". The only way OM would be available to my plants is if I put it there.
Carol, the key to planting roses in the ground in glacier slurry is to perk test your planting hole before you plant anything in it.
We can have very wet winters with up to 50" of rain in a four month period.
I noticed there there were no puddles even after days and days of rain. So I knew I had drainage. It took hours, and sometimes days, to dig a rose hole that drained well. Rose literature says a rose hole should drain within two hours. A very experienced rose friend told me that if my rose hole drained overnight, I was good to go.
Sometimes, I had to dig a trench away from the bottom of my rose hole to redirect the water to a spot nearby that allowed for drainage.
There was a learning curve on how to build my rose holes in such a way that would allow the roses to grow a root mass large enough to support them and to control drainage.
Weluvroses said:Yeah I must've misunderstood what you were meaning. Using just earthworms or their poop isnt enoug no. I use egg shells, I try to use less fruit bc of the acidic properties. Potato peels, any vegetables. I feed the worms. Its organic and breaks down as the worms eat it. But if you buy actual earth castings and mix it in your soil it is more than plenty to feed roses. If you mix it atleast 1 to 1 with top soil. But they are water soluble and dont need broke down again. The way they are made they are a finished product. They dont need to broke down again other than by water. Then the roses or plants can use it. The enzyme in the worms slime break it down while being made. If using worms you wanna make sure you dont use any salt derived ferts with them bc the salt base will kill your worms. My big 8x8 bed I just made, I added 500 worms too. Along with 75lbs of earth worm castings. And 20lbs of compost/manure. All mixed. Top soil, and native soil. The roses are loving it. And of course I added the worms last as to not chop them up while mixing.
Seth, you almost have it right. You are very, very close. You need to understand that the nutrient molecule has to be small enough to be absorbed through the cell walls in the root system before it can benefit the rose. So, what you think is "ready to use" by the rose, still needs to be processed by the soil bacteria to make the nutrient molecules available to the plants.
When the "salt level" outside of the root is higher than inside the root, it stimulates the root cells to pull in the salt and that is how the roots absorb the nutrients. Until osmosis occurs, the plant cannot utilize any nutrients you have provided.
Yes, you CAN use "salt derived ferts" when there are worms in the beds. It's how you go about it that makes it possible. If you water throughly the day before feeding and then apply your liquid fert diluted to the point where you are providing a "light" feeding, you will not kill any worms or any soil bacteria. You are feeding the worms and the bacteria. Your worm casings are just easier for the bacteria to break down than other OM.
My soil will never be fertile. I am constantly adding OM to the beds to be broken down by the worms and soil organisms. The lousy part is hauling the necessary materials up from the street level to the house pad level now that I am living in an older body.
Enough, I have to run away from the computer and get some things done ...
