TOPIC: Help With Phosphorus - P vs. P2O5??

Hello, I was recommended to go to the website for Penn State University as that is where my soil sample gets analized as I had asked the difference in \"Ginseng-To Plant\" vs. \"Ginseng-To Maintain\". Well in doing so I read this on the site \"The elemental results in lb/A can be converted to oxide forms using the following conversions: P x 2.3 = P2O5 , K x 1. 2 = K2O, Mg x 1.6 = MgO\". Okay, so what form of P do we need 96 lb/A? Is it the oxidized or not oxidized? My results show both but not sure which is the one to go by according to the needs in Scott Person's book. I will attempt to attach the sample in two pictures so it will be large enough to read.

Thanks,

Jim

Hope it goes this try.

Again

Okay. Here goes again.

2nd half.

go to your local co-op feed store or extension office. if you live in penn, im sure there will be an extension office in your county. the county agent should be able to look at your sample and tell you what you need to know at no charge. it is odd that your soil is low in phosphate and not the other elements. leads me to believe you might have phosphate fixation in that soil. get on the net and look up phosphate fixation, there is plenty of info. in the message part of the sample it says to add \"steamed bone meal\" if only phosphate is needed. the co-op should have that in stock. maybe that will help you.

VAbuyer:
Thanks for that info about p fixation. Never heard of that. Sounded like it has pros and cons. Seemed like they were mainly referring to the fact it don't leach like nitrogen so much and could lead to an overdose if one were adding P. The sample I took the pic of was from a little higher on the hill above where the spring (water table level) comes out. This was a very slow flowing spring as it was always dry (no visible wetness) 10' below it. There is a deep vein of shallow coal outcropping ten feet below the spring output as I found it digging the spring out. The spring has since quit flowing due to the coal company that owns the deep coal vein 500' lower longwall mining their coal and destroying the water table but the P is even lower at the levels below the spring until you get all the way to the bottom of the slope and then they are the same as the soil above the spring. These recommendations they gave were on Ginseng-To Plant as I didn't know how this would affect the recommendations but I later found out that these recommendations are if one was tilling and adding ammendments to be tilled in.

I just wonder what Scott's book is referring to. Is it the P2O5 or just P? Actually I went back to the book and only find where he is saying 11 lb/acre but I am sure I read 96 lb./acre but fail to find that now. More confused! Yay!

use the bonemeal as suggested in the soil sample. it is natural not synthetic like oxidized phosphorus. id say person did not use synthetic fertilize because it isnt natural. synthetic fertilize is ok, but anytime a natural product can be used for fertilize it is better. reason being because anything natural puts organic material back to the soil along with whatever element is needed, i.e. phosphorus. synthetics put no organic material back to the ground, they simply are a cheap way to put a lot of minerals to the ground. the more organic matter in the soil the better all crops do. a natural fertilize kills two birds with one stone.

VA:

I really appreciate your input. I'm just worried about the bonemeal for two reasons. One the critters wanting to dig through it and the second reason is that I read a couple different times that it can cause the roots to be dense and hard and not the corky texture desired when dry. I'm thinking of playing it out and see how the darn things grow and quit dwelling on what might go wrong until I see results.

I did however see the other day when we had no snow on the ground, that the turkeys scratched up a 25 sq. ft. area where I planted seed and I even caught two of them on camera heading to the crime scene. They're going down this spring! Branches are getting spread all over the place this week, snow on the ground or not.

Thanks,
Jim