| There is a distinction between repotting and potting up, and I'm not sure where 'transplanting' falls in between the two. There's nothing to stop you from potting up whenever you wish, but tropical and subtropical plants (houseplants) are (from a physiologic perspective) best repotted in the month before their most robust growth, which for you would probably be Jun or early Jul. Some plants might be better to repot immediately after blooming, if your primary concern is a pretty plant and not what is best for the plant's vitality. The best answer for the fertilizer question is not "Stop fertilizing on X date" or even "withhold fertilizer when the plant is not growing". When you should or shouldn't fertilize depends on the relationship between plant size, growth rate, and most importantly, your watering habits and how well the soil drains. In the winter, I fertilize every time I water with a weak solution of fertilizer, but I use fast (draining) soils and flush the soil with the solution every time I water. You cannot do that if your soil is slow or you water in sips, but if you look at the whole picture, slow soils and/or watering in sips are bad either alone or in combination. Plants are growing even if you cannot see them growing. They need nutrition available in the soil to grow and keep their systems orderly. Advice to halt fertilizer ignores the needs of the plant in the assumption that you ARE using a slow soil and watering in sips, because if you are not, if you are using an appropriate soil and watering correctly, the advice is wholly inappropriate. An extrapolation of what I just said might be that if you DO need to stop fertilizing for fear that salt levels will rise too high, you are using an inappropriate soil or are not watering correctly. That isn't to say your plants will assuredly die if you don't use an appropriated soil and water/fertilize appropriately, but you will assuredly be making a notable portion of your plant's potential vitality unrealized. Al |
