winterberries

Hi,

Last fall I planted a number of winterberries, and they were a pleasure to watch through the winter. This summer they sprouted foliage a bit unevenly - ones more than others, and with different degrees of coverage of their branches. The fruit has been even more disappointing with only a couple of them producing berries. And, incidentally, these were quickly gone probably thanks to the squirrels or the birds. This fall I planted two new ones already with berries on them, and the berries were also gone overnight, redoubling my suspicion of the squirrels. I do have the appropriate pollinators, and the trees have received plenty of water, even in July when watering was the only way to keep plants alive through heat and drought. Some of them are in partial shade, but almost all of them have decent exposure at least part of the day.

My assumption is that I have to be patient and give them time to settle, but I wonder if you have any pointers to improve next year's yield of berries.

Thanks!

Your assumption is probably most valid - but you could help this evaluation with some additional information about your plants and site conditions.

List the names of what you have, for example:

•5 Ilex verticillata 'Winter Red' 5 gallon 24" tall

or

•3 Ilex verticillata 'Red Sprite' B&B 18" tall

Describe your soil conditions (acid, alkaline, pH; sandy, loamy, clayey, etc.).

Depending on the answers to the above, I may have some other advice to give. I am currently growing a couple dozen of the Winterberry Holly taxa, so I can give rather pointed commentary about most any that you may have (including Ilex decidua and some of the Rutgers hybrids).

Likely, you just have new plants that are spending resources rooting into their new locations and not investing in "eye candy" yet. Next spring, apply a nitrogen fertilizer at leaf out and after pollination (as fruit begin to form). This will assist in higher quality Winterberry Holly fruit display.

See also here (and consider membership!):

http://www.hollysocam.org/
http://www.hollysocam.org/knowgrow.htm

Thank you for your answer.

Here is what I have (Winter Red is by far the predominant variety):

Winterberry Holly "Jim Dandy" Ilex Verticillata 3 gallon
Winterberry Holly "Winter Red" Ilex Verticillata 3 gallon
Southern Gentleman Wntrbry Iliex Verticillata 3 gallon
Berry Nice Ilex Verticillata Verticillata "Spriber" (?) (gallons unknown)

The soil is clay for the most part. I never tested the acidity, although I assume it is rather acidic like in the rest of this area of New Jersey.

Given that you've planted container shrubs (and that means you should have all the roots - not losing any from B&B planting), then a decent fertilizer regimen next year should produce high quality results.

Note in late spring/early summer how much or how few flowers are present on your plants. That will be a key to fruiting potential. If you prune your plants during or after flowering, you are cutting off that fall's fruit. Don't do that.

Thanks. And Happy Thanksgiving.

What type or formula of fertilizer do you recommend?

I would use whatever fertilizer you have on hand (use it up!), and key on getting appropriate amounts of nitrogen. Barring any soil test to say whether you are lacking other nutrients, N is usually the deficient element.

If you are starting anew, I'd buy the easiest to apply and least expensive granular balanced fertilizer. I'm not sure how your area is outfitted; around here, that is 10-10-10 and can be purchased at any farm supply store. This means (by weight) you are getting 10% N in that formulation.

I am going to provide the exact text from Fred Galle's penultimate Hollies: The Genus Ilex, where he describes his fertilization regimen. I can't offer better.

Oh, and happy Thanksgiving to you and yours.

Some festive images from yesterday - very content Possumhaw Hollies (Ilex decidua 'Sundance').

Clearly, whatever you do, you're doing it right to get such a great specimen growing in your property. Congratulations!

I asked you about the fertilizer because the other day there was a segment on NPR "You Bet Your Garden" show on Sundays dedicated to that. Here's the transcript, which is available online:

"Fertilizer 101
Q. Twice this year friends have come to me and said, "My tomatoes are all vines and no fruit." I asked what they were fertilizing with (thinking they were applying too much nitrogen), and to my surprise both replied: “10-10-10”. I said, "That’ll do it." What I don't know is why anyone would think 10-10-10 is fine for their garden—or how to help them fix the problem they’ve caused. Maybe by next year the crappy chemical fertilizer will be flushed out by rain and winter?

---Michael in Albemarle, NC
A. I have mixed feelings about you, Michael. On one hand, you’re my new favorite listener for knowing how bogus so-called “balanced” fertilizers like 10-10-10 are. On the other hand, if more people DID know things like that I’d have to go out and find a real job.

Seriously, you’re absolutely correct: 10% nitrogen is only appropriate for non-flowering plants like sweet corn and lawns; it’s way too much ‘N’ for plants that flower, like tomatoes, squash, beans, peppers, melons, eggplant, and—oh yeah, flowers! Bogus ‘even number’ fertilizers like 10-10-10 and 20-20-20 are always composed of concentrated chemical salts; and the super-fast growth they cause makes plants extremely attractive to pests and diseases. And those salts—originally designed to be used as high explosives—ruin the soil, and kill the soil life that keeps plants naturally healthy. And finally, despite their arithmetic rhythm, fertilizers like 10-10-10 are also unbalanced. No plant uses those three nutrients in equal amounts.

A little background: The three numbers (commonly referred to as “N-P-K”) that appear on the label of every packaged fertilizer represent the three main plant nutrients: Nitrogen, Phosphorus and Potassium (which is sometimes called ‘Potash’). Studies have found that the ideal ratio of those nutrients for flowering plants is 3-1-2. (That’s 3% Nitrogen, 1% phosphorus & 2% potassium.) So look for that ratio on the label of packaged fertilizers; anything close to a 3-1-2, a 6-2-4 or a 9-3-6 should be ideal. (Beware higher numbers—that’s the realm of chemical salts.)

My advice to folks like Michael’s friends is to water on the heavy side to wash those salts out of the soil as quickly as possible, feed with compost alone for the rest of the season, and then move to organic fertilizers and/or compost in the future and sin no more!"

At this point, I'm watering these winterberries with root hormone every weekend, and I figure I'll start fertilizing them in late winter or early spring as on the quote you pasted on your response.

Thank you, again!

I'd challenge the authors of those statements to a debate any time they'd like. It is easy to discount "chemical fertilizers" and claim environmental destruction. It is an entirely different matter to deconstruct that straw man argument and talk about the nitrogen cycle in nature, and how when we garden that we might try to mimic that to the advantage of the plants we'd like to thrive. It takes a bigger man to state that while there has been an over-reliance on chemical fertilizers and a general ignorance of soil quality and health, in and of themselves - when used properly and according to label rates and recommendations - there is not an inherent problem with the use of 10-10-10 in home landscapes and gardening.

Discussions about healthy soils take many themes, more than what your question was about. I'm always in favor of healthy soils, and organic matter is but one component of that. Of course no plants use nutrients in any precise fashion that is on a fertilizer bag label, but you might search to the ends of the earth to find the exact one for each and every different species of plant that you are growing (out of its natural habitat at that, I might add). So, that argument is pretty stupid and lame to me.

I can agree with the statement that someone applied too much fertilizer, but not because it is a 10-10-10 formulation. It is the rate of application, which requires some rudimentary math skills, and then one is off to the races.

This is a dosage question. Just as with medicines, the right amount is the key. Too much anesthesia, too much aspirin - hell, too much water drowns us and too much sun gives us skin cancer! - you need to just have some sense when you garden, as you should in the rest of your life.

Just for everyone else reading this: how much stock do you put in someone who states "...non-flowering plants like sweet corn and lawns..." How does this person think these plants reproduce (like, set ears of corn)? It would be like catching fish in a bucket...

I wish I had access to the federal tax dollars that pay for that kind of narrow-minded programming. I'd come to your house, and help improve your gardening results - hands on.

And they say Spanish people are passionate about their beliefs... In fact, you should be able to debate him on Saturday afternoon on his weekly show by calling in - and make your pledge to NPR at the same time. They certainly won't be getting any cash from me...

I'm happy to see that it wasn't the 10-10-10 formulation that inhibited the fruit production (or the flowering in the summer). When I heard Mike McGrath with a special on fertilizer condenming these formulas, I headed for the shed and got rid of them.

Beliefs are one thing; facts and how they are presented are entirely another. You can be Spanish, Polish, Slovenian, etc. - you can listen to everything, but you don't have to fall for anything.

My problem with that presentation is that the author(s) seem to be mixing their gardening practices and promotions with their political/social agenda, and thus stating the parts/processes of gardening, etc. that match - and leaving a lot of the rest out. Chasing all that down would take more time (and likely, conflict) than this website normally tolerates.

So you threw out your fertilizer? Now the weeds at the landfill will be growing like gangbusters...

For anyone that wants to investigate any of this (which I highly encourage), read up - on line, or in your favorite chemistry/biology text - about how plant biology works.

•How does (and in what form) does a plant absorb nitrogen? Phosphorus? Potassium? Other elements? Why and when?

•What role does pH (as well as alkalinity) play in a plant's ability to absorb nutrients?

•What recognizable parts and/or functions of plants are affected by availability of certain nutrients? When?

It may be that I take all this for granted because I've always had a yen for science and chemistry, and reading about these things was easy and interesting. I have been fortunate enough to pursue a couple careers over the past 25 years where I've been able to observe and do in practical application that which I've read about and learned in an academic and research setting.

I have always wondered why people would bicker over a few dollars more or less on buying a plant, but would not think twice about the cost of chemicals, pesticides, fertilizers, etc. that really add up to a lot more money, are much more ephemeral, and often serve no purpose whatsoever because of the lack of knowledge about their appropriate use. Kind of like leaving the irrigation system on while it's raining, or air conditioning the all outdoors with the windows open.

Have we beaten up on your winterberry husbandry enough?

we have winterberry holly growing wild and have planted a few too , interesting about the nitrogen suggestion