fertilizer source for high phosphorus?

Persimman

5 year old buck +
Hey, howdy. I'm in my second season on this throw&mow patch, with soil tests from 1 yr ago and this year. The potash / potassium / K number came right up to a good range, but I still need more phosphorus / P. I'm concerned that if I do 19-19-19 again, I'll get too high on the K. Back before the turn of the century, I used rock phosphate for my P source. Now, my local ag supply thinks they don't have it. Is there a new modern correct name I need to use? I can't believe they don't have it. All our soils here are low P. If you don't do a soil test for your game patch, they tell you to "dump lime and phosphorus". It's the default setting. There are small plastic bags at the garden center, but that would be lots of $$. I'm looking for 100#, depending on how pure it is.
What's the current correct farmer name for a 100% phosphorus fertilizer?
 
100% phosphorus fertilizer
This isn't my forte but Googling it looks like Ammonium Phosphate might be something to look for. If memory serves Bone Meal is where gardeners get Phosphorus for things like tomatoes in more of an organic form.
 
Ammonium Phosphate is 16-20-0-14 (S). Beneficial if you need nitrogen and sulfur also.

I believe you can get 0-45-0 or 0-46-0 but it's fairly pricey. Verify from your soil test how much you actually need..

Another option is to include high amounts of buckwheat in your planting and let it mine it for you.
 
My first thought was buckwheat but for the money not sure how much it wil be able to mine this year


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I've seen 0-46-0 online, but not locally. Thanks for the comments re buckwheat. I can get a small crop in now, and run it again in the spring.
We have lots of poultry farming in this area. Poultry litter is probably providing all the phosphorus needed by the real farmers. Need to get a pick-up load to take to the woods.
 
Triple super phosphate 0-46-0
DAP Diammmonium phosphate 18-46-0

I suspect you'll have a hard time finding it in a 50-lb bag. Mostly used as materials in the blending of customer fertilizers.

I don't think I could ever have too much K (potassium). It doesn't leach as readily as nitrogen - but it does.

Off the top of my head 40-50 ppm p is in the high range. For k I'd guess its 200 ppm or more? Keep your bucket full if you can.


I'm not much of a miner....
 
Thanks all for the discussion. I couldn't find buckwheat or 0-45-0 before my expedition, so I just did without. This week I'll be able to get some transferred to a local dealer. I'm disappointed nobody had buckwheat. That would have fit in well with my summer planting.
 
Hey, howdy. I'm in my second season on this throw&mow patch, with soil tests from 1 yr ago and this year. The potash / potassium / K number came right up to a good range, but I still need more phosphorus / P. I'm concerned that if I do 19-19-19 again, I'll get too high on the K. Back before the turn of the century, I used rock phosphate for my P source. Now, my local ag supply thinks they don't have it. Is there a new modern correct name I need to use? I can't believe they don't have it. All our soils here are low P. If you don't do a soil test for your game patch, they tell you to "dump lime and phosphorus". It's the default setting. There are small plastic bags at the garden center, but that would be lots of $$. I'm looking for 100#, depending on how pure it is.
What's the current correct farmer name for a 100% phosphorus fertilizer?

First, keep in mind that mot of the fertilizer recommendations are for farmers planting monocultures that need to maximize yield to be profitable. For deer management and attraction, any plant that doesn't end up in a belly is not contributing to objectives, so yield is rarely a consideration for us. After enough years of reduced tillage, nutrient cycling also improves. So, unless you phosphorous is very low, I personally would probably ignore it. I'm going on 5 years with no fertilizer in poor high clay soils and I've seen no negative effects on plants or how deer relate to them.

If you are going to fertilizer with P, I'd consider MAP. It is much lower in N and higher in P and less expensive around here. It is 11-52-0. Back when I was fertilizing using traditional tillage, My coop would mix MAP and Potash for me since I didn't care about added N (Because I don't plant monocultures of N seeking crops and I do a lot of legume rotation and mixing).

Thanks,

Jack
 
First, keep in mind that mot of the fertilizer recommendations are for farmers planting monocultures that need to maximize yield to be profitable. For deer management and attraction, any plant that doesn't end up in a belly is not contributing to objectives, so yield is rarely a consideration for us. After enough years of reduced tillage, nutrient cycling also improves. So, unless you phosphorous is very low, I personally would probably ignore it. I'm going on 5 years with no fertilizer in poor high clay soils and I've seen no negative effects on plants or how deer relate to them.

If you are going to fertilizer with P, I'd consider MAP. It is much lower in N and higher in P and less expensive around here. It is 11-52-0. Back when I was fertilizing using traditional tillage, My coop would mix MAP and Potash for me since I didn't care about added N (Because I don't plant monocultures of N seeking crops and I do a lot of legume rotation and mixing).

Thanks,

Jack
Jack, I've considered your thoughts myself and have argued with my multiple personalities the plus and minuses of each side of the debate. I've decided for myself soil fertility is vitally important - even in food plotting. And, maybe, even in general habitat improvement where, judiciously applied, amending fertility can much improve plant vigor in the face of considerable challenges.

I know you are not a strong proponent of 'weed' control and I can let it go to a degree, but where perennial stands are involved I think it important to leverage the investment of time and money into establishment of such stands by doing what I can to improve the ability of the stand to survive and even flourish year after year.

A strong stand of vigorous perennials is an effective control of weeds. Get the pH right and it's the wrong pH for lots of weed species. Get the pH right and low levels of P and K are released for plant nutrition. In the worst climatic conditions, especially in the cold, wet period, ample supplies of P and K are necessary to put the perennial food plot plant in a position to explode when growing conditions become ideal. It does improve yield, but yield is a side-effect of a healthy plant.

Maybe less so, this applies to annual crops, acknowledging most are planted when growing conditions are more ideal.

So, I say, if your soil tests - a properly collected soil sample assumed - are in the high to very high range (consider understanding parts-per-million ppm), then - if your pH is ok - skip the fertilizer. An application provides little immediate benefit. At those levels it acts more like insurance. At the opposite end, very low and low levels of P & K need to be corrected to keep the return on you efforts where they will bring you joy!

And what can be said about pH that's not already been said. It doesn't have to be perfect, but keeping it in the low 6s is essential.

Food for thought....
 
Agree Dan, well stated.
 
Jack, I've considered your thoughts myself and have argued with my multiple personalities the plus and minuses of each side of the debate. I've decided for myself soil fertility is vitally important - even in food plotting. And, maybe, even in general habitat improvement where, judiciously applied, amending fertility can much improve plant vigor in the face of considerable challenges.

I know you are not a strong proponent of 'weed' control and I can let it go to a degree, but where perennial stands are involved I think it important to leverage the investment of time and money into establishment of such stands by doing what I can to improve the ability of the stand to survive and even flourish year after year.

A strong stand of vigorous perennials is an effective control of weeds. Get the pH right and it's the wrong pH for lots of weed species. Get the pH right and low levels of P and K are released for plant nutrition. In the worst climatic conditions, especially in the cold, wet period, ample supplies of P and K are necessary to put the perennial food plot plant in a position to explode when growing conditions become ideal. It does improve yield, but yield is a side-effect of a healthy plant.

Maybe less so, this applies to annual crops, acknowledging most are planted when growing conditions are more ideal.

So, I say, if your soil tests - a properly collected soil sample assumed - are in the high to very high range (consider understanding parts-per-million ppm), then - if your pH is ok - skip the fertilizer. An application provides little immediate benefit. At those levels it acts more like insurance. At the opposite end, very low and low levels of P & K need to be corrected to keep the return on you efforts where they will bring you joy!

And what can be said about pH that's not already been said. It doesn't have to be perfect, but keeping it in the low 6s is essential.

Food for thought....

I'm completely on board with pH. In my personal experience, I get a measurable response from both plants and deer with pH. Perhaps this is because my native pH is so low. Fortunately, one of the upsides of my clay is that lime moves slowly thorough my soils. It takes 3 to 4 tons/ac to get the pH of new ground right. It takes a number of years before my pH drops enough to require 1 ton/ac of maintenance lime.

I also completely agree that soil fertility is important, but what level of fertility and how it is achieved is were I see a deviation between farming and deer management. Because only a fraction of a deer's diet comes from food plots, there are limits to the impact we can have with them. I find bigger impacts on my herd from large scale activities that improve native foods like timber management and controlled burns. From a QDM perspective, my food plots are targeted at specific stress periods. From a hunting perspective, some of my plots are focused at attraction for kill plots.

A farmer planting a monoculture had a high plant density all of which need the same nutrients. Deer managers generally can plant mixes of crops at a much lower density and the nutrients each crop needs is different. So, with lower over all soil fertility, on a per acre basis, each plant may still get sufficient nutrition for good growth. Just like humans taking vitamins, anything that is excess of what your body needs, is pissed away. Similarly, as long as a plant has the nutrition it needs, it will grow well, and excess nutrients don't help it.

Soil tests were developed for farmers. Once I took my soil test results, without the labs recommendations, and gave them to the coop manager, and a couple friends who are soil scientists and told them what I planted and asked for fertilizer recommendations. There was a lot of variation between each of the recommendations and between those and the lab's (VT) recommendation. There is hard science to measuring soil nutrients, but it seems there is both art and science, and a lot of experience, in soil recommendations.

There are lots of factors involved, and I certainly don't criticize folks that use commercial fertilizers. I did it for many years, and will be quick to do it again, if my plots no longer meet their objectives. Most of us have a limited budget and what we don't use in one area becomes available for another. For me, money saved on commercial fertilizer can better be applied to meet my deer management objectives in other areas. That may not be true for everyone.

We are in complete agreement in the importance of soil fertility, but for me, that does not mean applying commercial fertilizer according to a soil test recommendation. It means, getting pH right, watching my plants and deer and seeing if my plot objectives are being met. If they are, I'll spend those funds on other projects. If not, I'll be first in line for the fertilizer buggy. :emoji_smile:

Thanks,

Jack
 
What's the numbers. If you feel you meddle phosphorus you could use 6-24-24. Osts and clover will love the extra potassium.

Anytime I till, I prefer to use 6-24-24.

I need decent plots, not perfect ones. So I'm not too fussy on tonnage.
 
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