Today we’ll be covering each step of fertilizing your peace lily and we’re doing it in a way that is easy for anyone to understand, no matter your skill level. With a little bit of knowledge about the science behind the process, fertilizing really is a simple process and I’m here to show you just how easy it can be.
Benefits to Fertilizing
Fertilizing your peace lily can be compared to giving it a vitamin. It provides it with nutrients it needs and keeps it in good health, but it’s not necessary for its survival. Just as with humans, vitamins are great for us but we won’t die without them. Fertilizing your peace lily properly can help your peace lily have more blooms, growth, and have less problems if properly done. If you’d like to have your peace lily growing at its optimum rate and have a greater chance of seeing more of those beautiful white blooms, then fertilizing is the way to go.
What Fertilizer To Use
Choosing a fertilizer can be the hardest part to even getting started. There’s SO many fertilizers out here, some better than others. Before I give you my specific recommendation, my personal opinion is to steer clear of most organic fertilizers such as “fish meal”, “blood meal”, “worm poop”, etc. They have a lot of names and varieties but most of them have such little nutritional value and high prices that they aren’t worth it.
The only upside of these organic fertilizers is that they definitely are environmentally friendly, but I would argue that normal fertilizers are just as environmentally friendly when they’re used properly. As long as you aren’t dumping your fertilizer down the drain or into your local river, you won’t be having a negative impact on the environment with your normal “un-organic” fertilizer. That’s my two cents, and you’re welcome to take it or leave it.
I personally use Jack’s Classic 20-20-20 All Purpose Fertilizer. I’ll put its Amazon link right here. (We are Amazon Associates and earn a small commission from sales that use these links at no extra cost to you.)
This is not a sponsored product, just one that I’ve personally used and have been really pleased with. It was recommended to me by a friend in the indoor plant industry and it’s high quality and has high nutritional value that can be used on your peace lily as well as many other indoor plants. It’s also lasted me a long time, I haven’t even used half over the two years that I’ve used it with my indoor plants. It definitely is a worthy investment for a healthy peace lily or for the health of any indoor plant, for that matter.
To understand more about this fertilizer and how it’ll be working with your peace lily, here’s a quick overview. The 20-20-20 on its label relates to the percentage of NPK (Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Potassium (K)), in that order. You’ll find these numbers listed on every fertilizer that you ever buy so you can compare their NPK values.
For Jack’s Classic 20-20-20 Fertilizer, 20% of the active ingredients is nitrogen, another 20% is phosphorus, and 20% for potassium. The remaining percentage are micronutrients or other ingredients to help your plant. NPK are considered to be the three main macronutrients that all plants need. Put simply, nitrogen helps with overall greenness, phosphorus helps roots and flower development (an important piece for the peace lily and it’s flowers), and potassium helps with the general cellular functions.
The reason why you’re putting these nutrients into your soil via a fertilizer is because they are depleted from the soil whenever you water and your plant takes nutrients up through its roots. If you were to never fertilize your plant would eventually run out of key nutrients and show signs of deficiencies with yellowing leaves, off-color leaves, etc. Most peace lilies would take years to show these signs of nutrient deficiency, so if you do notice a yellowing leaf use the method of deduction to figure out what it was caused by before assuming it just needs fertilizer.
The peace lily naturally will have its leaves turn yellow when they’re old and can be removed simply by snipping them off with scissors, or it can turn yellow in extreme causes of under or over watering. Just be sure that any yellow leaves aren’t being caused by some other factor before you assume it needs fertilizer and more nutrients in its soil.
How Often Should I Fertilize My Peace Lily
Despite popular belief, there’s not a certain time of year or strict schedule to follow with fertilizing your peace lily. The amount of sun that your peace lily is getting, will determine how often you should be fertilizing it. Here are some general guidelines that you can refer to:
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High light = Fertilize every six weeks
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Medium light = Fertilize 2-3 times a year
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Low light = Once or maybe twice a year
If you fertilize your peace lily more often than this, you risk overloading your peace lily with nutrients and it could cause nutrient toxicity or fertilizer burn. You’ll see this manifested in crisp leaf edges, or sudden yellowing leaves. This happens because a plant in high light is gathering lots of energy and taking up nutrients rapidly to keep up with all the energy it can expend.
A plant in low light is not taking up nutrients very fast and therefore will not need to be fertilized very often. If you’re still not sure and doubt your ability to know how much light your peace lily is getting, go on the more conservative side and do it twice a year.
Fertilization Steps
Now that you know the basics of how fertilization works and how often you should be doing it, you’re ready to fertilize! Before we begin, check off the following two statements to make sure your peace lily is actually ready to be fertilized:
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My peace lily is in good health & has no underlying conditions
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I am not fertilizing to fix my peace lily’s problems
The reason I have you check off those boxes because too many times I’ve seen people use fertilizer as a sort of “Hail Mary” to fix their plant’s problems and get it to where they think it should be. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way. If your peace lily is already stressed and struggling with something else like unhealthy watering practices, pests, sun scorch, etc., then fertilizing it can just add stress to it and could hurt it more than help it. If your peace lily isn’t struggling with anything and seems to be in good health, it will be just fine with being fertilized!
#1: Gather Supplies
Fertilizing your plant is really simple so you won’t need too many things to get the job done. All you’re going to need is your fertilizer, a clean watering can or bucket (I keep a separate bucket just for fertilizing), a liquid measuring cup, and your peace lily, of course.
#2: Mix Water and Fertilizer
This step is probably the most important one! If you use too much fertilizer, you risk causing fertilizer burn which can damage your plant with browned leaf tips and edges (more details on step 4). Read the label of your fertilizer and make sure that you’re adding the proper amount of fertilizer for the amount of water you have. If anything, err on the side of adding less fertilizer so that you don’t risk harming your peace lily.
Once you’ve poured in the fertilizer into the cool water, give it a good mix around to ensure that it fully dissolves into the water.
#3: Drench the Soil
Fully drench/saturate the soil so that water comes out of the bottom of the pot. This will ensure that ALL of the soil has a chance to replenish its nutrients and reach all of your peace lily’s roots. I recommend placing your peace lily in the sink or somewhere where you don’t mind the excess water running out.
**If your peace lily’s pot has no drainage holes then do not follow this rule! Instead, be careful with how much water you pour into the soil. If you add too much you risk having it sit at the bottom of the pot and cause your roots to literally rot and your peace lily to die. You can stretch out watering it with your fertilizer-water mix over a set of a few weeks, or you can carefully water it once without adding too much.
#4: Watch for Signs of Over-Fertilization
If you notice any brown edges, browned tips, entire yellow or browned leaves on your peace lily a day or two after fertilizing it, it’s a sign you used too much fertilizer. But don’t worry! It can be mended by placing your peace lily in the sink and leaching out the soil. This means that you place it under running water and let the water drain out the bottom of the pot. Do this for a minute or two to help get rid of excess fertilizer and your peace lily will have great chances of bouncing back and being just fine.
I hope this guide helps you fertilize your peace lily properly without causing any undue harm to it. Fertilizing it can be a great way to replenish the soil and help your peace lily reach its full potential. I really do hope your peace lily will reward your efforts with some beautiful white blooms! You deserve it after the research you’ve put into this plant of yours!
Be sure to pin this article for future reference and you can read more about peace lily care here:
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