I did have an incident of fert burn using Black Kow, but it was probably my fault for not tilling it in evenly, so I must have plunked the baby plant into some straight manure. Every time I heft a bag of that stuff, I also feel like I've paid for a whole lot of sand with a little bit of composted manure in it . . . fine for you with your clay soil, Ken. But here we have nothing but sand to begin with! What i want for amendment is pure compost.
Anyway, the other point I wanted to make was about the labeling of plants as "drought tolerant". Even though it says that on a plant label, it doesn't mean you can plant it out and walk away. That plant will still need steady moisture to get established, and then in a full sun situation it will need supplemental water at least once a week if there is no rain - or even little rain. Kate's point about keeping the area evenly moist, and planting in winter or early spring to let the plants established can't be stressed enough.
Heaven knows, we have heavy rain showers here in Florida, but sometimes they only last a few minutes, and that's not deep enough water for new transplants to survive. I'm looking out the window at one right now - big fat raindrops but . . it's easing up after about 5 minutes! That much rain will barely penetrate the top inch of the soil.
