When using Phos.-Acid pH-Down products, how do you calculate the phosphorous 'load' into your fertilization #'s?

SU2

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I've been using 2tsp/5gal of my "Root Farm" pH-Down product (diluted phosphoric acid) whenever I'm out of rainwater (4.7pH, compared to my tap's 8pH alkaline water!), the problem I have is that I'm not wanting to bump my phos intake as it makes my bougies try to flower even more than they already do (which I'm trying to avoid/thwart while developing them- sacrificing temp beauty to turn stock to pre-bonsai quicker!), so while I love using proper-pH water (my chlorosis issues are almost gone!), I'm wary of the fact I'm achieving it with phosphoric acid because I have no idea if this form of phos is available to the roots (my understanding is it is) so I'm hoping someone w/ better chem-knowledge than I can tell me what % of the phosphoric-acid I should consider "equipotent" to the P% of my fertilizers so that I can do the math and figure-out just how much P this pH-Down is adding to my fert regimen!

Thanks for any thoughts on this one, even if not a specific %/# that's "root-ready/available" :)
 

Anthony

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You may wish to read at the - NPK topic, it is on the second or
third page. .

Additionally, we simply use Miracle Gro Lawn fertiliser at 1/3
strength into moist soil and the Bougainvillea, responds with
green growth, once in a while some flowers.
Mostly N
Good day
Anthony

Turned out to be more red than pink.
Branches grow to 3 feet and are cut back to 2 or 3 or 1 inch.
Many years to a bonsai

pink_p10.jpg
 
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Wires_Guy_wires

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Use hydrochloric, nitric or sulfuric acid instead.
HCl and H2SO4 are both not very disturbing to the soil. Nitric acid adds up to the nitrogen cycle eventually.

Our rain water is around 5-6.5. It has been lower, due to German industry blowing it's smoke over us. If there's a lot of industry in the area, or anything close in a 60 mile radius, your rain will get more acidic.

Anyhow, for calculations:
Phosphorus is 30.97 grams/Mole
Phosphoric acid is 97.994 grams/Mole
Roughly 30% of your phosphoric acid (in weight) is P.
With a coarse calculation method, you could say that a litre of phosphoric acid solution, weighs 1kg.
Let's say that solution is 10% V/V phosphoric acid, so that makes 100mL of pure H3PO4
It's density of H3PO4 is 1.885 g/mL, which comes down to 100*1.885= 188.5 grams of the stuff per litre of solution. Multiply by the 30% of the weight.
188.5*0.3= 56.55 grams/L. That's what's in your bottle, before you use it.

Now depending on how much mL's you use, you could calculate how many grams are going into the soil eventually.
Let's say you need 5mL to bring the pH down to the ideal level..
56.55 grams/L /1000mL = 0.05655 grams per mL
0.05655 * 5 mL = 0.28275 grams of P per cannister of water.

Now it's up to you to calculate how much a cannister holds, and how much of that is given to each plant.

Please note that I went into biology and biochemistry to NOT have to do these calculations. Or at least, only once, and then just go with the protocol. It's been 3 years since the last time, so please correct me if that's needed.

If you want to use gallons, pints, bushels, or whatever, be my guest. I'm not going to, and I never will.
 

SU2

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You may wish to read at the - NPK topic, it is on the second or
third page. .

Additionally, we simply use Miracle Gro Lawn fertiliser at 1/3
strength into moist soil and the Bougainvillea, responds with
green growth, once in a while some flowers.
Mostly N
Good day
Anthony

Turned out to be more red than pink.
Branches grow to 3 feet and are cut back to 2 or 3 or 1 inch.
Many years to a bonsai

View attachment 200987

Am gonna check that thread out I've got it tabbed right now (if it hasn't come up already at least there's enough subscribed people that I should get solid #'s! I should be able to calculate it so I know that adding 1tsp / gal of phos.acid is comparable to adding 1tbsp / gal of X% phosphorous fertilizer!) I imagine you mean the 24-8-16 miracle-gro, that's what I use as a liquid feed every ~5-7d maybe, I aim to make it ~50% of my fertilizer regimen (the other half is 15-9-12 Osmocote extended-release pellets, am liking the idea of having a combination so there's always some fert there *and* I can give it nitro boosts if I know it's going to be a strongly-sunny week!)

That pic there...I'm made of questions and hope you've got a moment & the kindness to help because that ^ is such a great example of the type of stumps I have so many of, that I'm trying to learn how to develop...

- you say you grow to 3' and then cut back, that's what I'd been doing and was told not to, because at 3' the bases / collars are still pretty thin, I'd been convinced you're not supposed to cut back anywhere near that hard until the primaries' bases are ~about as thick as you want them to be (whereas in your, and my old, approach the branches are thin when they're cut, this leads to a lot of ramification on thin primaries but, since growing the primaries out is step#1 in development, the idea would be to force growth and doing a hard-prune (to 1-3 nodes) every time a branch hits 3' seems like it would only hinder things..very curious here!)

- I'm very curious about the # of primaries, and the approach you'd take with them on a stump like the one pictured- I know you've gotta grow-out a bunch of branches off the bat to get a good root-mass but, once you're there, how many primaries/branches would you leave on a stump that size, would it be more like 8 or 25? I guess I'm starting to think that some of the 'block trunk' bougies are developed in a way where the goal is not to try and grow primaries that are properly tapered-into the block, but rather to have lots of branches just radiating from the central block, each branch essentially being its own 'pad', and the pads altogether forming a shape that works for the stump....is that kind of how you'd approach that? Or would you be trying to grow-out 3-5" thick primaries? If the latter, I'd think that the pruning is counterproductive, though if the former then I can see the pruning making sense, since the ultimate composure would be one where there'd be a relatively 'tight' canopy, one that'd look good when it had foliage but wouldn't look like a regular bonsai when defoliated (because the trunk-to-primary taper just wouldn't be there)


I know Erik Wigert recommends doing 'silhouette'/hedge-trim style prunings ('shape pruning') on bougies right out of the gate (I actually just pruned one that way today to give his method a shot), the word on Reddit was 100% that I shouldn't be growing to 3' and then cutting back hard, but that cutting back hard was determined by the girth of the collars (regardless of the length of the branch)

(you don't happen to have a progress-album for that bougie do you? Or know of any prog-albums with 'blocky' stuff like that? Have had a hell of a time finding good progress albums of block-style stuff, graham potter's youtubes are the best I've found for learning how to turn blocks into art! Or "trying to", anyways ;D )

Example for the lulz, my first-ever collected specimen (I didn't choose the trunk-line I found it already-cut, though I'm not sure how much better I'd have approached it TBH!)
a.jpg aaand after many, many hours: b.jpg

This guy ^ is the bastard-stepchild of my collection lol, have no idea what I'll ever do with it so just keep growing it out, keep carving-back the dead/dying areas, figure maybe I can do some real heavy carving in a year or two and make something 'unique' but yeah I've got a lot of 'blocky' material that's just ~1yr old that I'm hoping to develop over the years and don't want to waste time by growing half as fast as I could've due to my pruning-tech! I do know Wigert got a bougie on display at Epcot just 2yrs after collecting it, tbh that in and of itself should've had me following his recommendation (he has 1 article on bougie-development on his site) over anyone else's, I took pics & measurements on several bougies today so will be able to gauge the results of the one I just trimmed in his fashion ('hedge'/silhouette type pruning) It actually makes sense in a way, I mean the two extremes both have flaws: cutting back hard every time they hit ~3' and start slowing growth / readying to flower is just so taxing to the plant, but to just let branches grow until their collars are the appropriate thickness means to leave it un-touched for a long time (pruning certainly stimulates growth when done right!), Wigert's reco is basically the halfway point and he deals with a LOT of bougies, am seriously regretting not having done his style from the get-go, at least on a handful of specimen, to try it out- I've only done your way (which is how I'd done it since the start, til I was told it was wrong and that if the collars aren't thick enough then hard-prunes aren't appropriate yet) and the 'let it grow unrestricted' way (all season this year- I pruned all my bougies very early in the year and have been letting the majority of them bush-out since, just unrestricted growth:
20180714_162948.jpg

For something like that ^ my instinct is to go prune it, but the bases of those shoots aren't where I want them to be...I actually just pinched the very tips of every shoot on that one last week, as it was starting to flower so I figured tip-pinching would just force a stronger flower-flush (the idea being to let it flower for a lil while and then go in and hard-prune, hoping I get vegetative growth after the prune instead of more flowers- have found no rhyme or reason for why this does/doesn't occur after hard-prunes, can't figure it out it seems 100% arbitrary!)

I'm halfway through my growing-season right now, have maybe 4mo tops before it's too-cold for any growth- I'm starting to think that now is the time I've gotta do any hard-prunes if they're to be done this year, it sucks because I've got so many specimen that want a couple more months' growth before that but it's too late in the season for both! But, if I'm doing silhouette/hedge/Wigert-style pruning, maybe I can have the best of both worlds, forcing the growth-spurts after prunings w/o cutting so much that it's gotta re-grow substantial amounts of foliage in a short time!!

[for posterity: Wigert's article: http://www.wigertsbonsai.com/bougainvillea-development/ ]
 

Anthony

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@SU2 ,

here is what we do [ for over 35 years ]

Know your plant.
Bougainvillea wood rots easily for us.
Try to stay away from large wounds.

They grow fastest [ trunk wise ] in the ground [ or what we use
is a concrete shape.
So it is trunk size and 6 branches in the ground.

The large oversized bonsai pots are for branch refinement.

We use - Lingnan - grow and clip - directional pruning.
This technique is more in harmony with how a tree grows and
repairs damage.

Our soil for refinement is a simple mix of 5 mm silica based gravel
and compost.

The 30 to 36 inch branch extension in some plants will add on
an inch of trunk.

The first stage of a dug up stump is to get it healthy --------
this would be the branch extension.
The more you encourage this, the healthier the plant will be.

You should at this time be planning a Design - preferably
drawn, as the brain can forget where wants to go.

Our fertiliser is a 1/3 strength Miracle Gro lawn fertiliser applied
once weekly, into moist soil.
This fertiliser does not encourage flowering [ though it will happen ]

I am afraid this simple practice is all we do.
Good Day
Anthony
 

BE.REAL

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@SU2 ,

here is what we do [ for over 35 years ]

Know your plant.
Bougainvillea wood rots easily for us.
Try to stay away from large wounds.

They grow fastest [ trunk wise ] in the ground [ or what we use
is a concrete shape.
So it is trunk size and 6 branches in the ground.

The large oversized bonsai pots are for branch refinement.

We use - Lingnan - grow and clip - directional pruning.
This technique is more in harmony with how a tree grows and
repairs damage.

Our soil for refinement is a simple mix of 5 mm silica based gravel
and compost.

The 30 to 36 inch branch extension in some plants will add on
an inch of trunk.

The first stage of a dug up stump is to get it healthy --------
this would be the branch extension.
The more you encourage this, the healthier the plant will be.

You should at this time be planning a Design - preferably
drawn, as the brain can forget where wants to go.

Our fertiliser is a 1/3 strength Miracle Gro lawn fertiliser applied
once weekly, into moist soil.
This fertiliser does not encourage flowering [ though it will happen ]

I am afraid this simple practice is all we do.
Good Day
Anthony
Hello Good Sir,
questions regarding the Bougie's if I may?
1st, im in zone 6A, clearly different than you.
I have been told they like root bound/tight pots. However, I am looking for growth in my 3., So I cant do ground( winter, it can be a bitch, HA), but what do you think of larger pot? I like making mine, mostly cement of some sort. so, what do you think deeper, or wide and shallow? I appreciate any tips.
I hope to extend my season with a slightly heated greenhouse, but am also going to be upgrading my indoor lighting for the winter.
thanks for any tips and advice.

Im late on repotting them, but may experiment with different sizes, but then again, I just want them to grow. 1 is very special, one of my 1st trees.. OHHHHH. haha. But thoughts on soil.
I ususally am inorganic on everything, mayb some organic on non-conifers.

Thanks
 

Anthony

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Hello @BE.REAL,

as long as you understand that the Bougainvillea is a Sub-Tropical
and for us rests from Christmas to mid February, you could try this.

A large pot saucer, less than 3 inches deep and watch the watering.
You should be okay.
The vining shrub to 30+ feet, is easy to grow and work with [ for us ]

As usual please do your tests on rooted cuttings not the mother.

As to soil, we use 7 parts 5 mm inorganic and 3 parts organic.
You can make it a drier soil by changing to 2 parts inorganic.
The inorganic is not porous,
Good Luck
Anthony

an example of a saucer

leanin10.jpg
 
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