🍆🌱Using 20-20-20 Fertilizer on Crops🌱🍆

Growing up in a family of farmers I've seen sacks of 20-20-20 fertilizers early on. My grandfather used them in his rice farm. There are organic alternatives to water soluble fertilizers used in this post, they are not easy to get however and takes lots of effort to produce. Buying them from producers can get a little expensive too. As a comparison to power up one of the pots shown below with a vermicast (worm poop) will cost about a dollar, using NPK 20-20-20 a dollar will be enough to fertilize 20 pots these size.

The picture to the right is one of the first water soluble fertilizers I used when I was just starting to learn how to grow vegetables.

N-P-K 14-14-14 What???

I did not have an understanding what these letters and numbers meant when I was just starting. I will attempt to explain that too and save you the intimidation I felt in the beginning. N - Nitrogen, P - Phosphoric Acid, and K - Potash are what the letters stand for. The numbers are the weight in percentage of the macro nutrients mentioned earlier. Always in the same order regardless of weight.

The one in the photo as an example is called a balanced fertilizer. I got this from a hardware and gardening shop at the mall for which I paid $3 for one Kilogram. I have since found a specialty shop selling seed and fertilizers selling 20-20-20 at $.5 per Kilogram.

How N-P-K Help in Crop's Growth???

Nitrogen helps in better leaf growth. Naturally this is being used more to grow leafy vegetables and ornamental. There is a water soluble fertilizer called Urea with nothing but Nitrogen.

Phosphoric Acid helps with flowers and fruit production. This is particularly helpful with increasing fruit production of tomatoes, strawberries, eggplants, and other heavy feeder fruiting vegetables.

Potash helps with the development of root system for the crops. More application of Potash is helpful in growing root crops like potatoes, carrots, and beets.

Step 1 - Prepare The Potting Mix

Till the potting mix three inches from the base of the plant as a guide in the application of the fertilizer. It is important to not get to close to the base for the Nitrogen in the soluble fertilizer can burn the root system especially for young seedlings like in the sample.

Why not Wait till the Plant is Bigger?

The young plant can benefit from the application of Nitrogen and Potash, when done correctly to assist in the growth of leaves which will in turn support food production through photosynthesis, and stronger root system to allow the plant to take macro nutrients from the soil better.

Accumulation of Phosphoric Acid early in the life of the plant can help in flower and fruit production later on too.

Step 2 - Application

Follow the tilled potting mix in the application of the soluble fertilizer as shown in the picture and avoid the pellets from going near the base of the plant.

It is important to avoid over application of fertilizer so for 14" in diameter pots like in this example, use only 2-3 tablespoon of the fertilizer.

The next steps are really straightforward - cover the tilled potting mix and soluble fertilizer and water generously as shown in the below pictures.

Step 3 - Cover the Fertilizer Pellets with Potting Mix

Step 4 - Water Generously

This process is to be repeated after a month, and then every two weeks when the crop starts producing fruits.

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