June 19th: “... and rounding the first corner, it’s Better World, pulling ahead by a nose...”

Well would you look at that... the organic plant food Better World seems to be pulling ahead (some might say it’s nose to nose) with the chemical plant food MiracleGro.

Have a look at the latest ‘racing stats’:

                        MiracleGro                                                                 Better World 

                         current height     recent gain /since May 25th       current height           recent gain/since May 25th 

• Raspberry           25.0 in                       +2.0/ +9.5                                   20.0 in                      +1.0/ +7.0

• Basil                     18.0                            +2.0/ +8.0                                    16.0                           +1.5/ +7.0

• Tomato               18.0                           +2.0/  +12.0                                  18.0                        +3.0/ +12.0

• Marigold          mutated, tiny blooms                                                       large, full blooms

 At a glance, these two boxes look like a mess of weeds. Not orderly at all. That kinda describes me too. 

The sharp-eyed among you will notice that the tomato plants are booming, pretty much taking over the main body of the box. (MiracleGro in left box, Better World in right box.) Basil is on the left hand side in both boxes. Peeking out at the  back, a raspberry plant (which has yet to flower). 

The marigolds are over-shadowed by the tomato plants, which will soon need to be staked. 

The very observant among you will notice I've moved the boxes 90º. This so they'll get even more sunlight throughout the day.

Here’s the new garden layout.  I can't move the fig plant in the right corner without breaking the box, so it will just have to do with morning sunlight. 

Back to those marigolds...

Here's the largest marigold in the MiracleGro box. 

Note the deformed shape, small size.

 

Here’s the marigolds on Better World organic plant food. 

Bigger. Fuller. Proper shape.

 Water only: tallest plant here is a jalapeno pepper. Still no strawberries. 

 Miracle Gro: eggplant and lettuce seem to be doing well. Only got one tiny strawberry from this plant so far. There are two others ripening now.

 Better World organic plant food: everything seems to be coming along evenly. Already had 3 strawberries from this one plant.

 Plants clearly like to be fed. Beans clearly prefer Better World over plain water or MiracleGro. Grown from seeds. 

 Radishes need food too. Here I'd give a slight advantage to MiracleGro.  Grown from seed. I'll be transplanting these into larger containers this week.

 Here's beans grown from seed with Better World Plant Food mixed directly into the soil. Planted at the same time as the ones in the small pots. No doubt the container size matters. 

Still... look at this growth. 

Here's the same plant 10 days ago:

Bean pot on June 9th.

 More strawberries coming along, planted in soil mixed lightly with Better World.

Dang! The stuff works!! 

Here’s my fig tree.

 I didn’t even know you could grow figs in Canada! My plant already has 7 fruits on it. When I bought it a month ago it had one. Planted in soil mixed lightly with Better World.

So why do I think Better World Plant food is pulling ahead of MiracleGro? Because I counted the tomato blossoms tonight.

MiracleGro: 7 flowers.

Better World: 16 flowers.