It could. I'd probably keep your mix on the acidic side to try and counteract it. Depends what you're growing. I wouldn't try blueberries or azaleas in such a container, but lots of other things would be OK.

I bought it from Home depot back in October 2005. It was marked King Sago. I see them at home depot all of the time and they all look just like mine. I had it in a northeastern window over the winter getting some morning sun. In late March we had two consecutive days in the low 80s. I stuck it out in full sun and it started. It took some time to finish. It didn't finish until late April until it went out for the year. I said April-May but as I think about it it definately was those two days in March that started it. Any idea how they do as far as getting rootbound? I have never re-potted it since I bought it.

After Easter, I'll call the town landscaping division. It's probably one guy or two. They'll at least know where they got them from. I wouldn't doubt it, if they purchased them from a place in Visalia, CA. Can't remember the name of the nursery. It's even more surprising that they are surrounded by cement sidewalks. That concrete gets quite hot, too. Also, consider the cement leaching all that lime down into the rootzone. I wonder if they use salts on their sidewalks after winter snowfalls.

I should add that an obvious question is - how much? Too much nitrogen will cause nitrogen burn. Here's what I did. I assumed that the dose of lawn fertilizer that was good for the lawn would be OK for veggies. For 20-0-0, you're supposed to apply 5 lbs over 5 weeks on a 1000 square foot lawn. 1 lb is 3 cups. If you do the math, that works out to about half a cup a week for my 150 square foot bed. I guess if you're watering a lot, and suffering a lot of leaching, you might want to use a little more.