Keep Your Containers Blooming Into Fall – This Natural Fertilizer Gives Plants a Late-Season Boost
Gardeners can use fish fertilizer on flowering and fruiting plants in late summer for a strong end to the season
Towards the end of the season, fertilizing your flowers with a high-potassium feed can reward you with a late burst of blooms. Flower beds, borders, and containers can enjoy a last hurrah as your late summer gardens fill up with color.
Gardeners can use fast-acting liquid fertilizers until the plant stops producing new flowers, which can be mid-September in colder climates and later in warmer zones. For many gardeners, this means a few more weeks of using a high-potassium feed every 1-2 weeks to encourage more blooms. But remember to stop feeding a month before your first predicted frost.
Natural products make the best summer fertilizers, including seaweed, kelp, and plant-based teas. Another example is Alaska Morbloom fertilizer, available at Walmart, which is made from fish, and this natural nutrient source is ideal for producing lots of flowers. Use it on flower beds, containers, and hanging baskets for a late dazzling display of blooms.
A one-gallon bottle of Alaska Morbloom fertilizer with an NPK of 0-10-10. Mix the product with water and apply it to plants throughout the summer.
Using Fish Fertilizer in Late Summer
Alaska Morbloom fertilizer is made from the leftovers and byproducts of the Alaskan fishing industry. The likes of bones, scales, skin, and trimmings are cooked up, and the liquids extracted from them – and these solubles that are packed with goodness go into the product along with muriate of potash.
The product has an NPK ratio of 0-10-10. It is packed with beneficial phosphorus and potassium, which are crucial for developing fruits and flowers. These two are essential plant nutrients in late summer, helping to promote bigger, stronger flowers in herbaceous perennials and annuals, and ripening fruits like tomatoes, peppers, or cucumbers.
What Alaska Morbloom fertilizer doesn’t have is supplemental nitrogen. Plants don’t want lots of nitrogen in late summer, though, as that nutrient encourages lush, vegetative growth. As plants reach the end of the season and prepare for dormancy, new stems and foliage are undesirable – they don’t have time to harden off and get killed by frosts. This makes the plant more susceptible to pests and diseases.
A fast-acting liquid fertilizer high in phosphorus and potassium is therefore ideal for promoting a late flush of flowers. They are not suitable for use earlier in the season, when nitrogen is essential. But they come to the fore once plants start flowering, when you want to switch summer fertilizers to a high-potassium feed.
Use it on bedding plants, perennials, roses, vines, shrubs, or any flowering plants in containers or hanging baskets. Combine regular feeding with deadheading spent blooms to extend the season as long as possible. If you are growing tomatoes or other fruiting crops, use it too to help your existing fruits ripen.
Use Alaska Morbloom fertilizer on in-ground plants every three weeks, or on potted plants in container gardens every 1-2 weeks.
Shake the bottle, mix it with water as recommended on the product label, and use it when you water plants – never apply it directly without diluting the feed. To fertilize containers, for example, mix one tablespoon per gallon of water. Apply the solution to the base of plants, rather than watering from above.
You can fertilize flowers with a high-potash feed until a month before your first predicted frost. Sticking to a schedule, especially when fertilizing flowers in pots, will give you ongoing color and a longer season of blooms to enjoy longer into fall.
Shop Fertilizers for Late Summer
A super-concentrated, high-phosphorus and potassium feed with an NPK of 2-15-15. It is ideal for encouraging flowers and fruits in high summer.
A water-soluble liquid fertilizer with an NPK of 10-30-20 that helps to increase the amount and size of blooms. It can be used on flowers, vegetables, and fruit.
A concentrated liquid fertilizer made from koi and tilapia fish manure. This one-gallon container has an NPK ratio of 2-1-4 and is an OMRI-listed organic product.
FAQs
Is Alaska Morbloom Fertilizer Organic?
Alaska Morbloom fertilizer is made from natural ingredients, but it is not an OMRI-listed organic product as it includes some chemical components. Another product in the company's range, Alaska Fish Fertilizer 5-1-1 (available at Walmart), is an OMRI-listed organic fertilizer. This feed is best used earlier in the year because it’s high in nitrogen.
Is Alaska Morbloom Fertilizer Good for Vegetables?
Yes, it is a good fertilizer for fruit-producing vegetables, including tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, eggplant, squash, and pumpkins. The feed can help these crops ripen fruits later in the season. It is not a good fertilizer for leafy vegetables or root crops.
Seaweed is a great natural fertilizer for both flowers and vegetables, too. If you want to use seaweed as garden fertilizer, you can buy dried or liquid products from retailers or harvest fresh seaweed. The best ways to use fresh seaweed in the garden are to steep it in water to make a tea or spread it as a mulching layer over the soil.
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