Tree Fertilisation

A checklist of the situations in which the correct action is to wait — and what to investigate instead.

A tree managing extreme heat is not in a growth phase. Feeding it adds a salt load at the moment it can least tolerate one.

Where the mulch sits matters more than what it is made of. The single most common and most damaging error is packing it against the trunk.

Compost around a tree is a soil treatment, not a feed. What it contributes, where it goes, and the nitrogen effect to expect from coarse material.

Where you put it decides whether it works. The canopy-edge rule, its important limit under drip irrigation, and why the trunk is the worst place of...

A tree in a pot depends entirely on you for water, nutrients and salt management. Both leaching and salt accumulation happen faster than in the ground.

A tree in a narrow bed or paved cut-out is limited by soil volume, not soil fertility. Feeding cannot buy back rooting space.

Grass and tree roots occupy the same soil and are watered and fed on completely different schedules. That conflict, not soil fertility, is usually the problem.

Poor flowering is usually not a fertiliser problem — and the reflex response often makes it worse.

A mature tree in reasonable health rarely needs feeding. When it does, the reason is usually visible in the soil test, not in the leaves.

Once a tree has established, nutrition can begin to matter. Where to place it, what to expect, and why the root zone is no longer where...

Between planting and independence, the tree is building the root system everything else depends on. What helps, what interferes, and how to tell it is working.