Neilsons' Plant Elixir is a mild formula for orchids and houseplants, made from naturally-sourced fertilizer salts in meticulously honed proportions, partly diluted in the purest Oregon aquifer water.
Shake well and mix 1 part product with 3 parts water (preferably filtered, distilled, or rain water), then apply to the roots of your plants.
For best results, collect the runoff and pour it back over for full saturation without wasting Elixir, then drain thoroughly. Or water first with clean water and drain thoroughly to prep the potting mix for moisture, then douse a small amount of Elixir into the container so that it gets down to the roots.
Some people like to dilute the product as usual and dispense it from a spray bottle to the roots and for air plants.
Our product developer, Tom Neilson, sent leaf tissue samples from our orchid farm to a soil and plant laboratory once a month for nearly 40 years. He tweaked the formula each time, finally arriving at the desired nutrient levels, while ensuring they remain consistent throughout seasonal cycles. The target levels were set by a consortium of west-coast nursery growers that included his dad, Duncan Sr.
In order to compete on a large scale in the orchid cut-flower market, our product's creator, Tom Neilson, needed the strongest plants to grow the longest lasting blooms that could make it cross country and into a corsage or wedding bouquet. He realized that having the ideal nutrient formula was the key and because of his success in creating it, he became one of the largest cymbidium orchid growers in the United States.
It has a good concentration of magnesium, which is important as an activator of other ingredients, without being high in sulfur. Some other fertilizers use shortcuts resulting in either too much sulfur or not enough magnesium.
Magnesium is key for bloom and robust growth, but is also a catalyst for the other nutrients, meaning that they aren't fully activated if there isn't enough magnesium around.
Our formula sticks with a non-sulfuric form of magnesium, which requires that the product be partly diluted. If it were any more concentrated, some of the nutrients would crystallize in combination with each other and no longer be available to the plants.
Some fertilizers stay deficient in magnesium in order to be fully concentrated. Or they use magnesium sulfate, which can be concentrated in combination with the other nutrients, but brings a huge unwanted dose of sulfur to the plants. So this is how our elixir is low in sulfur, complete in magnesium, and partly diluted.
Some of the ingredients are in tiny amounts, so there'd be no way for the user to get a uniform dose of the formula in the correct and safe proportions.
Generally, no, but you can just drop back to once every 3 or 4 waterings. Ours is a mild formula that works as a "continuous liquid feed," similar to a hydroponic model. There's no danger in burning the roots, but sometimes plants bloom continually better when in fear of survival, ie. nutrient deficient.
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