Fertilizing Hosta

[seiyafan]

I have a couple of Hostas planted by the last owner and I would like to know how to take good care of them. All I did in the past years was to spray deer repellent at a regular basis, and sprinkled some Milo in May. Thanks!

[andy10917]

Most hostas are not fussy. For the most part, just keep them out of mid-day or afternoon sun, give them some organic matter, keep the soil moist but not wet and they'll get along. Feed them and they'll grow and be ready to split maybe every three years.

For food, I give them leftover urea or Milorganite when I'm fertilizing, a 10-10-10 at the beginning of the season, and a now-and-then feeding of Blood Meal (when I feel like it).

The mortal enemy of the hosta and hosta owner is the Rat-On-Stilts (aka, Deer). The only thing that works all-season for me is Liquid Fence. I'm $72 in on that already this year. Second biggest issue is slugs.

[Dom_P]

Andy

I was looking at the liquid fence concentrate. There seem to be two version RTU 109 and 113. I tried to google what RTU means, but got a lot of bad hits. Any difference? and should I purchase one over the other?

[rydaddy]

RTU = Ready to use. Not concentrated.

[andy10917]

RTU means Ready-To-Use. You'll be paying someone (handsomely!) to add the water for you, and a trucker to carry the water from the manufacturer to the store where you buy it. If you need to protect 2-3 hostas, the RTU may be OK for you. With 600-700 (plus daylilies and gladiolas and more) of them, I go through quarts of the concentrate at a phenomenal rate. I am both looking at gallon-size purchases and reading all the research on legitimate homemade versions all the time.

It's a long season, with applications needed every 3-4 weeks. Seriously consider the concentrate.

[Dom_P]

Well that's kind of obvious in hindsight.

I was searching for concentrate and for some reason the RTU also showed up also. I ordered the concentrate. Apologies for highjacking the thread