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Want bigger, healthier tomato plants without relying on expensive fertilizers? In this video, we explain why bone meal has been a trusted gardening secret for generations. Learn how this old white powder helps tomatoes develop stronger roots, healthier plants, and better fruit production when used correctly.
We'll cover:
What bone meal actually is
How it benefits tomato plants
When and how to apply it
Common mistakes that reduce its effectiveness
Whether it's the right choice for your garden
If you're growing tomatoes this season, this simple amendment could make a noticeable difference when used in the right conditions.
👍 If you enjoy practical gardening tips, don't forget to Like, Subscribe, and turn on notifications so you never miss a new video!
#Gardening #Tomatoes #BoneMeal #OrganicGardening #VegetableGarden #TomatoTips #GardenHacks #GrowTomatoes #HomeGarden #GardenTips
Want bigger, healthier tomato plants without relying on expensive fertilizers? In this video, we explain why bone meal has been a trusted gardening secret for generations. Learn how this old white powder helps tomatoes develop stronger roots, healthier plants, and better fruit production when used correctly.
We'll cover:
What bone meal actually is
How it benefits tomato plants
When and how to apply it
Common mistakes that reduce its effectiveness
Whether it's the right choice for your garden
If you're growing tomatoes this season, this simple amendment could make a noticeable difference when used in the right conditions.
👍 If you enjoy practical gardening tips, don't forget to Like, Subscribe, and turn on notifications so you never miss a new video!
#Gardening #Tomatoes #BoneMeal #OrganicGardening #VegetableGarden #TomatoTips #GardenHacks #GrowTomatoes #HomeGarden #GardenTips
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00Let me show you something that has been going into the hole under my tomato plants for as
00:05long as I have been setting them out, and under my grandfathers before me.
00:10It is a plain white powder, and it costs next to nothing, and it is one of the oldest and
00:16surest ways I know to get a plant that blooms heavy and sets a great deal of fruit, instead
00:23of a plant that grows tall and leafy and green and gives you hardly a tomato to show for
00:28it.
00:29That powder is bone meal.
00:32Just what the name says, it is bone, ground down fine into a powder.
00:38And I will be straight with you right at the top, the way I always am, because there is
00:42a great deal of loud talk on the garden nowadays, and I do not care for it.
00:48This is not magic.
00:50It will not double your harvest overnight, like some fellow on the television will promise
00:55you.
00:55What it will do, used right and used patient, is feed your fruiting plants the one thing
01:02they most need to make blooms and set fruit slow and steady all season long.
01:09And that, over a summer, makes a real and honest difference you can see with your own eyes.
01:16Not a miracle.
01:24My name is Elias Yoder.
01:27I farm a piece of ground here in Lancaster County, in Pennsylvania, that my family has worked
01:33since 1838.
01:35And this business of bone meal is about as old as farming itself, for folks have always
01:41known that ground-up bone put back into the earth feeds the next crop.
01:46Nothing was wasted on the old farms.
01:50The bones from the butchering, burned and crushed, went right back into the ground to feed what
01:56grew there.
01:57That is the whole circle of it, and it is a good and thrifty circle.
02:02I can still see my grandfather at the burn barrel of a winter, the bones from the seasons butchering
02:09going in, and come spring he would crush what was left to a grit and a powder with the back
02:15of a spade on a flat stone, and that went into the ground under the plants.
02:20Nothing bought, nothing wasted.
02:23He used to say the good Lord made a farm to feed itself if a man was only wise enough
02:29to
02:29let it, and that every bone and every peeling and every fallen leaf was meant to go back into
02:36the ground it came from.
02:38I did not understand the whole of it as a boy.
02:41I understand it now.
02:43There is a wholeness to the old way of farming that we have mostly lost, where nothing was
02:49garbage because everything had its place in the circle.
02:53Bone meal is just one plain piece of that old wholeness.
02:58Before I go on, I will say this once and then leave it be.
03:02I gathered the whole of it, all these old ways of feeding your ground and your crops, into
03:09a book.
03:10You can find it at EliasYoder.com.
03:14The book is the long version.
03:16If you want it, it is there.
03:18I will not mention it again.
03:20Now let me explain to you plainly why bone meal does what it does, because once you understand
03:27it, you will know how to use it and when, and you will not be fooled by anyone selling
03:32you the wrong thing.
03:34Every plant needs feeding, and a plant's feed comes in three main parts.
03:40I am going to give them to you in plain words, not the fancy letters and numbers on the sack,
03:46because the plain words are what matter.
03:49The first part of a plant's feed is the one that pushes green, leafy growth.
03:54Give a plant plenty of that, and it grows big and tall and leafy with deep green leaves.
04:01Now that sounds fine, but here is the trap that catches so many gardeners.
04:06If you feed your tomatoes too much of that leafy growth food, you get a great big beautiful
04:12bush of a plant, dark green and vigorous and handsome, and hardly any tomatoes on it at
04:19all.
04:20All the plant's strength went into leaves instead of fruit.
04:23I have seen many a discouraged gardener with a tomato plant like a small tree, and not a
04:30dozen tomatoes on it, and this is why.
04:33The second part of a plant's feed is the one that builds strong roots and most of all, drives
04:39the blooming and the setting of fruit.
04:42This is the part we care about today.
04:45This is the very thing that turns a leafy plant into a fruitful one, and bone meal is rich
04:51in exactly this.
04:53That is the whole secret.
04:55Bone meal feeds the fruit and bloom part of the plant's diet without pouring on more of
05:00the leafy growth part that you do not need once the plant is big enough.
05:05And the third part of a plant's feed is a kind of all-around strength, the part that
05:10keeps the whole plant healthy and running well, hardy, and able to do all its living.
05:16A plant needs all three parts to live.
05:18But by choosing what you feed, you can steer a plant toward what you want from it, more
05:24leaf or more fruit.
05:26And when it is tomatoes and peppers and squash and fruit you are after, it is that second
05:32part, the bloom and fruit feeding, that you want to give it plenty of.
05:36That is bone meal's gift.
05:39Now here is the thing that makes bone meal so good, and it is the very thing that folks
05:44who do not understand it get wrong.
05:47Bone meal works slow.
05:50It does not dissolve and wash away in the first rain like some quick powder from a box.
05:56Being real bone, it breaks down slow in the soil, a little at a time, released by the tiny
06:03living things in the ground that go to work on it.
06:05And that slowness is not a fault, it is the whole beauty of it.
06:10It means the plant gets a steady, gentle trickle of that fruit and bloom feeding over weeks and
06:17months, just the pace a plant can actually take up and use, instead of one big flood it cannot
06:24use and that mostly washes away.
06:27Slow and steady is how a plant likes to eat, the same as a person does better on regular
06:33meals than on one enormous feast and then nothing.
06:37That slow trickle is why bone meal keeps a plant blooming and setting fruit so well and
06:43so long.
06:44Because it breaks down slow, and because it is a natural thing broken down by the life
06:50in the soil, rather than a harsh chemical, you also need not fear it burning your plant
06:56the way a strong, quick fertilizer can.
06:59You can set it right against the roots and it will not scorch them.
07:03That is another mercy of it.
07:06One thing to know when you go to buy it.
07:08Get the finest ground bone meal you can find, powdered as fine as flour.
07:14The finer it is ground, the quicker the soil life can get at it and break it down for
07:19your plant.
07:20Coarse chunks of bone can sit in the ground for years before they do you any good.
07:27Fine powder goes to work in good time.
07:30So look for the finely powdered kind.
07:33And here is a thing that follows from all this, worth understanding, because it explains
07:38why some folks get poor results and blame the bone meal when the fault is elsewhere.
07:44Bone meal does not feed the plant directly.
07:47It feeds the soil and the soil feeds the plant.
07:51It is the tiny living things in good ground, the same ones that break down a leaf or a bit
07:57of manure, that go to work on that bone powder and slowly turn it into a form the roots can
08:03drink.
08:04Which means bone meal in dead, poor, lifeless ground does you little good, because there is
08:11nothing alive down there to break it down and hand it up.
08:16But bone meal worked into rich, living, well composted soil, full of that quiet life, gets
08:23broken down and delivered to your plant beautifully.
08:26So the richer and more alive you keep your soil, the better every bit of feeding you add will
08:34work.
08:35It is one more reason the old people put such store by compost and manure, for living soil
08:42is the engine that makes all the rest of it run.
08:46Feed the soil first, keep it alive, and then what you add to it can do its work.
08:52Now, before I show you how to put it in, let me say an honest word about two things folks
08:58argue over, because I want to give you the fair truth and not just one side.
09:04Some will tell you never to add any bone meal at all unless you first pay for a soil test,
09:10because your ground might already have plenty of that fruit and bloom feeding in it, and
09:15adding more would be waste.
09:17Now, there is some sense in that, and I will not wave it away.
09:21A soil test is a useful thing, and if you garden a large piece of ground, or you are having
09:27troubles you cannot puzzle out, it is worth doing, and most counties will test a jar of
09:32your soil for a small fee.
09:34I would never tell you a soil test is worthless, but I will tell you this plainly too.
09:40A vegetable garden is a hungry thing.
09:43It takes a great deal out of the ground every single season, far more than it puts back,
09:50and that fruit and bloom feeding in particular gets drawn down and used up by a heavy cropping
09:56garden faster than most folks think.
09:59So even ground that tested rich a couple years back may well be running short now.
10:05For most of us, working a home garden, the honest way is much as it always was.
10:11Watch your plants, learn your ground by tending it year on year, and feed it what it plainly
10:18wants.
10:19If your plants grow leafy and lush, but will not set fruit, that is your ground telling
10:24you it is short on the bloom and fruit feeding, plain as a spoken word, and a soil test only
10:31confirms what the plant already showed you.
10:34But I will be honest with you about the other side of it too, for I will not let you
10:38think
10:39this powder cures every trouble.
10:41Sometimes a tomato drops its blossoms and sets no fruit, not from any lack of feeding at all,
10:48but because the weather has turned too hot, for a tomato will not set in a brutal heat,
10:53no matter how well you feed it.
10:55And sometimes the fruit sets, but the bottom of it goes black and rotten, and that is a
11:01different lack again, a shortage of the lime that eggshell and old bone both carry, made
11:07worse by uneven watering.
11:10So do not think bone meal is a cure-all.
11:13It is not.
11:14It feeds the bloom and fruit part of the plant's diet, and it does that well, but a plant wants
11:20steady water and fair weather and a balanced table besides.
11:24I would be a poor teacher if I sold you one powder as the answer to everything.
11:29It is one good tool among several, and a wise gardener keeps his whole kit, not just the
11:35one shiny thing.
11:37And some will tell you a plant does not need much of that feeding at all, just enough to
11:42get by.
11:43Well, I do not garden to get by.
11:46There is a difference between a plant that merely survives and a plant that thrives and gives
11:51you all it has in it to give.
11:53A man who eats just barely enough to live does not do a hard day's work well, and a plant
12:00fed just barely enough to live does not give you a heavy harvest.
12:04I want my plants strong and thriving and loaded with fruit, not merely limping along.
12:10So I feed them well.
12:12Not to excess mind, for too much of anything throws a plant out of balance, but well and
12:17steady, so they have what they need to be truly fruitful and not just alive.
12:23Now let me show you how I put it in when I plant a tomato, for the tomato is where
12:27this
12:28matters most and where I use it every single time.
12:32The first thing, and this is worth a word of its own because it is a fine trick, is that
12:37a tomato likes to be planted deep.
12:40Deeper than you would plant most anything else.
12:42A tomato has the peculiar and wonderful ability to grow new roots all up and down its buried
12:49stem.
12:49So when you set a tomato out, you dig a good deep hole, deeper than the pot it came in,
12:55and you strip off the lower leaves and bury a good long stretch of the stem down in the
13:00ground.
13:01All along that buried stem, new roots will come out, and a plant with a big strong root system
13:08like that will feed itself better, and stand the dry spells better, and give you far more
13:13fruit.
13:15So plant your tomato deep.
13:17That alone is worth the knowing.
13:19Now, down in the bottom of that deep hole, I work in my feeding.
13:24A good bit of the bone meal for the bloom and fruit strength, and if you have some good
13:29all-around organic fertilizer, or better yet, some rich compost and old rotted manure, work
13:35that in too.
13:37Mix it into the soil at the bottom of the hole.
13:39Do not just leave it sitting on top.
13:42This matters.
13:43Bone meal and the like must be worked down into the soil, in among the roots, because
13:49it is the living things in the soil that break it down and hand it to the plant.
13:54Left sitting dry on the surface, it does little, and may just wash away in a rain.
14:00So work it in, down where the roots will find it.
14:04I like to dust the root ball of the plant itself with a little bone meal as I set it
14:09in, and
14:10dust the sides of the hole too, so the feeding is all around the roots that are going to spread
14:16out into it.
14:18Then you backfill the hole part way.
14:20Firm the soil down gently with your hands so there are no hollow air pockets around the
14:26roots, add a little more feeding, and fill it the rest of the way.
14:31Firm it in, and water it well to settle the soil close around the roots and to ease the
14:37shock of transplanting.
14:39A weak drink of something gentle at planting, a little compost tea, or a mild fishy motion,
14:46helps a new transplant get over the shock and take hold, though plain water will do if that
14:52is what you have.
14:54Then lay your mulch back over the top, that blanket of straw or leaves we have talked about,
15:00to hold the moisture and keep the soil life happy down where your feeding is working.
15:07Now here is how you keep it up through the season, for the planting is only the start.
15:12As the plant grows and blooms and sets its fruit, it keeps drawing on that bloom and fruit
15:19feeding, so you feed it a little more along the way.
15:23About every two weeks through the growing season, I give each plant a small measure of
15:29bone meal, something like three quarters of a tablespoon, and I do not just scatter it
15:34on top.
15:35I scratch it gently into the top inch of the soil around the plant, right in, so it can
15:42break down and reach the roots.
15:44A small amount, worked in, every couple of weeks.
15:49That steady feeding is what keeps a plant blooming and setting fruit right along, instead of quitting
15:55on you early.
15:57Now here is a thing many folks never think of, and it will save you both money and waste,
16:03so listen close, because this is where wisdom comes in over just dumping on fertilizer.
16:11You do not keep feeding a plant for blooms after it has stopped blooming.
16:17It sounds simple said plain like that, but folks get it wrong all the time.
16:23Some tomatoes are the kind that grow to a certain size, set all their fruit in one big flush,
16:29and then they are done blooming for good.
16:33For a plant like that, once it has set its fruit and quit making new blooms, there is no
16:39sense feeding it any more of the bloom and fruit powder.
16:43It has no more blooms to make.
16:46You would just be pouring good bone meal into the ground for nothing, wasting it.
16:52So for those once and done kinds, you feed them up to their bloom time, and then you stop.
16:59Other tomatoes are the kind that keep growing, and keep blooming, and keep setting fruit all
17:05the season long, right up until the frost cuts them down in the fall.
17:11Those you keep feeding longer.
17:13But even with those, use your head about the end of the season.
17:18Work backwards from when your first frost usually comes.
17:22If a bloom needs, say, a couple months to turn into a ripe tomato, then any bloom that opens
17:29too close to frost will never have time to ripen into anything you can eat.
17:35So there is no sense feeding for blooms so late that those blooms can never come to fruit.
17:42Some weeks before your frost, you can stop, because past that point you are only feeding
17:48blooms that will die green on the vine when the cold comes.
17:53The little cherry kinds are a bit of an exception, for they ripen so quick you can feed them later
17:59than the big ones.
18:01But the plain principle holds.
18:04Feed for blooms while blooms can still become fruit, and not a day longer.
18:11That is thrift, and thrift is just respect for what a thing costs.
18:18Let me say a plain word about who profits from you not knowing this, because it is worth
18:24understanding and it is no dark scheme.
18:27It is simpler than that.
18:29There is money in selling you a bright new bottle of bloom booster every spring.
18:35Some quick blue powder with a big promise on the label.
18:39There is far less money in a sack of plain ground bone that lasts you years and costs a few
18:46dollars, and none at all in teaching you that the old butchering scraps went back into the
18:53ground for free.
18:55So the plain old cheap thing does not get advertised, and the pricey quick thing does, and the knowing
19:02of the old way slips away a little more each year.
19:07Not because anyone is hiding it.
19:09Because no one profits by teaching it.
19:12The money runs toward the bright bottle and away from the plain sack, and always has.
19:20That is the whole of it.
19:22So there is the whole of it.
19:24Bone meal, ground fine, feeds the bloom and fruit part of a plant's diet, slow and steady,
19:32without burning and without waste.
19:35Plant your tomato deep.
19:37Work the bone meal and your compost down into the hole among the roots.
19:42Feed a little more every couple weeks as it grows, and stop feeding for blooms once the
19:48blooming is done or the frost draws too near.
19:51Do that, and you will have plants that bloom heavy and set fruit heavy, and a harvest to
19:59be proud of, all from a plain white powder as old as farming.
20:05Tell me down in the comments what county you garden in, and how your tomatoes have done
20:11for you, whether they grow all leaf and no fruit, which is a common trouble, or whether
20:17they set well.
20:19And if your own family had an old way of feeding the tomato patch, a fish head buried under
20:25each plant or some such, put it down there, for I am always glad to learn the old ways
20:31folks are still keeping.
20:33Next time out here, I want to show you how to build a proper compost pile the old way,
20:39layer upon layer, so that you make your own black crumbly gold to feed all of this, and
20:47never have to buy a bag of fertilizer again.
20:50That compost is the very heart of feeding a garden, and it deserves a video all its own.
20:57But for now, remember this.
20:59There is no magic in a powder, white or blue, or any other color.
21:06There is only feeding the ground and the plant, plain and steady, with what they truly need,
21:13the way it was always done.
21:16The people who built this country with their hands knew that, and we are only just starting
21:21to remember it.
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