Dr. Earth Premium Gold Organic Fertilizer – Item of the Day
Every day I bring you an item on Amazon that I personally use or has been purchased by many members of the audience and I have researched enough to recommend.
Note – Even though I just brought this item around a couple weeks ago I am bringing it around today because I have added a PS with a video showing how I use it when I set out transplants.
Today’s TSP Amazon Item of the day is Dr. Earth Premium Gold Organic Fertilizer. This is part of my 4 core item regime for producing healthy and heavy bearing plants. I have written about this before but my four core items are, GS Plant Foods Liquid Kelp Fertilizer, Garrett Juice Plus, Endo Mycorrhizae Fungal Inoculation and of course Dr. Earth Premium Gold Organic Fertilizer. You can find them all under the tag “fertility” in one place.
Alert – 4-4-4 Premium Gold is out of stock in many sizes. Also the 4 pound bag just got jacked up to a stupid cost, don’t buy it. The 12 pound bags are almost sold out, the price on them is fine for now anyway.
I also was just told by a source it is “being discontinued”, I have not verified that. If you want a stand in, the alternate product I recommend would be Dr. Earth Tomato Vegetable and Herb Fertilizer. It is almost the same product though it does not have the perfect 4-4-4 ratio. Rather it has a 4-6-3 ratio which is still pretty balanced and I would not hesitate to use it.
I have also been asked for a lower cost option. While I am 100% sold on Dr. Earth products, I do find “Eco Scraps” fertilizer to have a good mix or beneficial organisms and a great NPK ratio. 3 four pound bags of it will cost about 22 dollars vs. 30 for 12 pounds of Dr. Earth. So if you need a lot of it it can save you some money and while it is not as good in my opinion I have used it and it is a damn good product too.
So given there are many fine quality organic solid fertilizers, why have I settled on Dr. Earth Premium Gold? First is that it is a balanced fertilizer, with an NPK ratio of 4-4-4 and what that means is that you are always giving your plants a good boost of all three primary nutrients.
Next is the make up, here are the ingredients: Fish meal, fish bone meal, mined potassium sulfate, soft rock phosphate, kelp meal, seaweed extract, and earthworm castings. Also contains humic acid (5%), aloe vera (2%), and yucca extract (1%), and prebiotic microbial food – soluble sugars (7%). In other words it doesn’t rely on any single source and hence you get a much more balanced source of nutrients for plants. Also note the humic acid included here, this goes beyond just fertilizer, it helps build soil and make all nutrients easier for the plants to absorb.
Of course you know that I am big on building soil as well, which is one reason I recommend a fungal inoculation in addition to fertilizers and foliar sprays. Well Dr. Earth Fertilizer builds upon that, because it contains seven strains of beneficial soil microbes plus ecto and endo mycorrhizae to build up even more soil biology.
To really dive home how well this combination works take a look at one of my wicking beds. These beds were planted with small plants about 5 weeks ago. On planting the roots were dusted with fungal inoculation, I put a small pinch of Dr. Earth Premium Gold Organic Fertilizer into the hole with them and they have been twice sprayed with a mix of Garrett Juice and Liquid Kelp. I think you will agree the vigor, growth and health are all very evident.
So give Dr. Earth Premium Gold Organic Fertilizer a shot on your garden today. You can get a 4lb bag for only 12.00. And two bags will serve most vegetable gardeners well over a season, possibly two. Again I just drop a small amount into the hole when I plant and about once a season I pull back mulch, add a pinch around my plants and water it in after replacing the mulch.
If you want to load up though they now have 25 pound bags on Amazon as well.
When I establish a new bed I also scatter a small amount across the entire surface before adding the mulch layer. If you want to really push things into super high biological activity, sprinkle a small amount of dry molasses on the soil at that time as well. Due to shipping costs I recommend you source dry molasses locally, most garden and landscape shops will have it.
Remember you can always find all of our reviews at TspAz.com
P.S. – Here is a video of me using the Dr. Earth Premium Gold Product when setting out transplants. Please note normally I also dust the roots with Endo Mycorrhizae Fungi. I did not in this video because I didn’t have any on hand and it was not available last I checked. That product is also now back in stock and you can find it here. Please note that Dr. Earth 4-4-4 actually has all four species of Mycorrhizae that the Endo Product has. I use it because the Endo product boosts the effect a LOT and a little of it goes a long way. It is a personal choice and you don’t need it but if you want to know more about why I use both tune in today’s show (Episode 2659) and i will be discussing it in the TspAz.com segment during the show closing.
Hey Jack,
The link doesn’t work. I get a page not found error from Amazon.
Thanks telling me, I hate when Amazon does that crap and changes links. Links updated.
Jack,
I have been listening to all your podcasts about building soil and starting a vegetable garden. Your links to this product are to the dry version and your references in the past podcasts are to the liquid. How would I use the dry to start my beds and the ongoing?
You just use this at the recommended amount per square foot. I also put a very small pinch in each hole when I put in transplants. I put about a half a shot glass around peppers and tomatoes, egg plants, etc. mid season as well.
Jack,
Based on your previous recommendation I already have this product and forgot to add it to the hole when planing bare-root raspberry plants and apple trees this weekend. I did put some composed manure at the bottom of the clayey hole to encourage root growth down. Do you recommend adding this now at the soil level or should I wait? Any other additives to use now?
Sure use it now, pull back mulch, apply to the surface and water in each evening for a few days.
Is dry molasses the same as sweet feed? I can find sweet feed at several local feed stores, but I cannot find dry molasses anywhere locally (no nurseries or garden stores seem to know anything about it).
No sweet feed is a pelletized feed, usually fed as a treat to horses. When you see a percentage that is the percent of protein in it. Example here https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/producers-pride-12-sweet-feed-50-lb
Jack,
What about using Blackstrap Molasses as a garden fertilizer. It’s very high in trace minerals, we can even fertilize ourselves with this one… 1 tablespoon to a cup of hot water and a dollop of sweet cream. Yummy!
I use Plantation, Organic, Blackstrap Molasses unsulphured; Amazon sells it for about 10 bucks in a 15 oz bottle, but I get it from the health food store for under 7.00. (Sulfuring is an after additive anyway from back in the day.)
Evelyn
Do you have any experience with the Fox Farm line of fertility products? One of my local nurseries carries it, and they have a lot of the same stuff in them. I got their liquid kelp so I didn’t have to wait for delivery, hoping it delivers!
Not a lot but I think highly of it. Would not hesitate to use it. I used their soil quite a bit when I was playing with microgreens. Amazing stuff.
I use many products from Fox Farm and find it to be very good stuff. Dr earth changed something on their liquids a couple of years back (can’t recall what it was). I was buying some Fox Farm stuff at the time and switched to their liquid products and have been happy with them.