Careful Using Borax Around Plants

Q. I screwed up in my pursuit of ant control with borax and sugar. It worked well but one evening last week I made the mistake of pouring my mixture right at the base of one of my vines rather than in a plastic bottle cap to keep it out of the soil. Now one of my vines is showing signs of toxic poisoning. I am very concerned about losing the other. I have added some 20-20-20 food hoping this will help recovery.

Boron is an essential plant nutrient. Plants need it in very small amounts. Most soils have plenty in them.

Borax contains about 11% boron by weight. Thats alot of boron when most plants are quite happy with soils containing 1-2 ppm boron. Thats ppm or parts per million.

As a salt, boron is transported to plant leaves where it accumulates along the edges of leaves where water goes into the air, thus concentrating it.

A. Ouch. What you are seeing is most likely boron toxicity. Boron is one of the 16 or 17 essential nutrients for plants, but it is needed in extremely small amounts. But if that very small amount is too much, it becomes toxic to plants. The difference between enough and too much is in the parts per million range! Grasses are a little more tolerant of higher amounts boron than other plants.

            Boron does not move in the soil very well like other contaminants. That might prove to be in your favor. Remove the surface soil around the plants down to about 4 to 6 inches and get rid of it. Hopefully you removed some boron mixed in the soil as well.

            Organics in the soil help to tie boron up and make it less available to plants. Put a fresh soil mix back with 50% compost mixed in it.

            Water dilutes salts including boron. Water the heck out of the areas where you applied borax to try and dilute the boron remaining in the soil and push it below the roots. Water, then let it drain, water, then let it drain. Do this four or five times to push salts containing high levels of boron below plant roots. Lastly, pray.