Urban Farms Texas Tomato Food

[elight]

Originally Posted by b54red

Why don't you call Urban Farms and talk to them their contact number is on the web site. I think they originally invented this product as a hydroponic food so maybe they can give you some information that would help you. I do know that TTF will settle out if left standing for too long. I use a hose end sprayer called a Chameleon. It works great for me though I do shake it up every few minutes to keep it well mixed as I am using it. I use it full strength and set to deliver 1 TBS to the gallon but make sure it is thoroughly mixed before pouring it into the hose end sprayer and I do filter it through a fine stainless steel mesh strainer into the hose end sprayer.

I spoke with Ed at Urban Farms. He said that the EZ-Flow will definitely exhibit the settling problem I described earlier, since this particular injector does not agitate the water enough to mix up the settled fertilizer. He said that the settling is mostly caused by the calcium in the product and that they experimented with leaving out the calcium for this purpose, but that it's so critical to the quality of the nutrient mix that they decided to leave it in.

He recommended a Dosatron instead. He said that they use them and have found the quality to be superb. (I think the reason I didn't want to use a Dosatron is because it requires a minimum flow above what I produce in my small garden, IIRC.)

He also described an easy-to-build DIY solution. Get a tank of some sort, fill it with the amount of water you need to deliver to your plants, and the corresponding amount of fertilizer. Get a cheap submersible pump and plumb it into your existing irrigation line (use a shut-off on the fertilizer branch so that your fresh water doesn't pour into your tank). When you want to fertilize, just disengage the shut-off and turn on the pump until the tank is emptied. I suggested that they put a schematic on their website or make a YouTube video as I think there are lots of people like me looking for inexpensive and simple solutions to home gardening, and there's not currently much information out there, and it would help them sell more product.