|
bonsaiTALK Master
Join Date: Mar-2004
Location: St-Hyacinthe, P.Québec
Country: CANADA
Posts: 442
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by SiNguyen
... (By the way, I am not convinced that drenching or "flushing" the pot would remove the salt build-up in potted plants, although this has been taught for a long time.) I think repotting and replacing the old soil is the only way of removing salt- build-up in a pot. For me, when my trees start to get leaf scorch at the tips, I start to plan for repotting, whenever it is appropriate (usually from February to August, for me in Southern California). Keeping the pots shaded and cool in the summer is good too. Wish you Ozzies some rain soon!
Si
|
Yes, SiNguyen, this is a good and detailed explaination of the tip burn disease problem and the measures needed for its control.
However, concerning the drenching of the potted tree to remove the built up salts, you definitely need a very well draining substrate and the use of lots of water. I was able to reduce the salinity of some of my potted bougainvilleas that were growing in approx. 1 liter pots from 5 millihos/cm to less than 2 millihos/cm by using more than 5 liters of water for the drench, making sure that all the water came out of the drain holes. When the substrate does not drain very fast, the procesus takes a much longer time because it takes more time for the water to get to the bottom of the pot and has sometimes to be repeated two or three times to get most of the salts out. Furthermore, if the pot contains fertiliser pellets, they should be preferable removed before the start of the drenching. |