Orchid fertilizer question

[Veronis]

What kind of solution of orchid fertilizer, and what kind (I have 30-10-10) do you use for your Nepenthes, and how many sprays do you give it per foliar feeding?

The book "The Savage Garden" suggested a foliar feeding twice monthly during the growing season of an Orchid 30-10-10 fertilizer.

It also said to use a "50% solution."

So, I got some Jack's Classic Orchid 30-10-10 fertilizer. Maybe this isn't the best kind.

I've heard 19-31-17 is better for Nepenthes than 30-10-10 from a few people.

Math stuff - I think I did this right:

One the box, it says "1/2 teaspoon per gallon of water" when using it every other week.

I'm using a 16 fluid oz spray container.

There are 128 oz in 1 gallon, so I need to use one-eighth of this amount for an orchid, or 1/16 teaspoon per 16 oz. water.

To make a 50% solution out of this, I need 1/32 of a teaspoon per 16 oz of water.

Funnily enough, 1/32 of a teaspoon = 1 smidgen (yes a smidgen is an official unit of measurement).

Even funnier, I have a "smidgen" measuring spoon, which holds barely 1.5 to 2 drops of water (heaping), so I can put "1 smidgen" of fertilizer in my 16 ounce spray bottle and this will be the right solution.

Am I mistaken? This seems like almost no fertilizer at all for 16 ounces of water.

 

[JMurphy97]

I just use the schultz brand for orchids. I'm not sure on the numbers but I add it to a gallon of water and use every other week or so.

 

[Clint]

Foliar feeding sucks unless you just want to build your confidence. My preference is to make it half strength and fill the pitchers up twice a month.

Don't worry about the number of sprays. Thoroughly wet down your plant if you're going to feed foliarly. You can fertilize the media if you want, but it's not my preference.

Just add 1/4 tsp. per gallon of water and store whatever water you don't use for the next two weeks, or use it on other plants. 1/32nd tsp. does not seem like a lot of fertilizer, but when you're measuring in ppm it is. It's sort of like medicine. It take 250 mcg. of Levothyroxine a day. That's only a quarter of one milligram. To put it into perspective, a dime weighs about 2.22 grams. The medicine I take would weigh 0.000112612613 the weight off one dime. It's an incredibly small amount, but when put into perspective, I take double the dose of the vast majority of people who take this hormone, so it's actually a lot when you consider what it is. Twice the pharmacy has given me 30 pills instead of 60, since apparently they never have anyone who takes such a large dose. Big things come in small packages, which is why 1/32nd tsp. is actually the same as 1/4th tsp when used in one gallon. The ratios are the same.

Whoo. I hope I put that into perspective for you. This is why people over fertilize. They think it's such a tiny amount (when it's not), so they add more until they think it looks like enough, then they burn their plants.

 

[phissionkorps]

1/4th tsp of 19-31-17 in 1 gal of water. Water the plants like normal with that soln once every two weeksish. Flush your pots w/i 72 hrs.

 

[xvart]

Just for the search engines sake, I want to link to this other thread that is going on about fertilizing. And I'm closing this one so we don't get two of the same conversation occurring in two different threads.

xvart.