Permie alternative to NPK / Standard Fertilizer Mix

I'm using SmartGardener to help up my gardening game this year.  I love that it gives you a to-do list, though it needs some tweaking to make it permaculture friendly.  

How would you translate this into permaculture?

Soil Preparation
Compost (N), 2 inch(es), in top 10in of soil, 1 time
Due OnFeb 12, 2025

Soil Preparation
Standard Mix, 5 pound(s) per 100 sq. ft., in top 10in of soil, 1 time
Due OnFeb 12, 2025
A standard mix will supply potassium, phosphorus and any additional nutrients required.

Obviously I'd topdress vs. dig in to the top 10in of soil, but is there really a need to do compost AND fertilizer?  What would be a substitute for the NPK/Standard mix, if not compost?

Welcome to the forum.

I know nothing about the product you mention.

Most folks on the forum use compost tea to boost plants.

This thread from a few years back might help you or others:

https://permies.com/t/178369/permaculturalists-fertilizer-shortage-concern

A few others:

https://permies.com/t/58001/Fertility-Fertilizers

https://permies.com/t/185538/composting/Liquid-fertilizer-Compost-Compost-tea

I keep reading books that say compost is better fertilizer than anything you could buy. Either composted organic matter or composted very "clean" animal manure.

My kitchen scraps don't provide much compost, so I am still buying the cleanest OMRI-labelled fertilizer I can find, but I would love to find a better source.

There are a few different ways to brush a cat ( ) to get to your end goal so don't take what I do to be gospel but it works for me.

In my experience, fertilizer recommendations are viewed as quick nutrition (in the big picture) and compost provides a longer term, slow leaching nutrition. The thing that I have discovered for myself is that different composts can provide different nutrients. If you use good quality composts, you don't need to touch fertilizers. For example, I have a household compost pile to divert compostables from going into more traditional waste streams. This gets a whole variety of stuff and in my anecdotal experience is a pretty balanced compost in the end. My hen house litter is literally just poultry manure and wood shavings as carbon. Poultry manure is considered a nitrogen forward compost which can be utilized similar to nitrogen fertilizer.

Compost teas, plant matter teas, and the like have shown me positive results which I interpret to be perhaps a more soluble nutrient being available to the plant roots. I like the idea and follow the principles of trying to keep soil as intact as possible and keeping roots in it. A developed and established biome of soil critters and mycelium have been my goal and I feel like I am starting to see the positives of it. I just have to keep the organic matter filled up each year as the soil level dramatically drops even with deep compost levels.

it needs some tweaking to make it permaculture friendly.  

I guess the first question back is what are you trying to do? Then: Are you starting with a previous garden? How did things grow? What are you hoping to grow there this year? What is your soil and climate like? To my mind permaculture is not something that comes out of a box ready made, it is a design system. Without knowing the constraints and assets you have it is difficult to give a simple answer.
Mine would be - 'feed the soil not the plant'. Take a look at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fp0d6vVzQ8 ; a quick excerpt from the Master Gardener course at Wheaton labs for some interesting pointers.

Nancy Reading wrote:

it needs some tweaking to make it permaculture friendly.  

I guess the first question back is what are you trying to do? Then: Are you starting with a previous garden? How did things grow? What are you hoping to grow there this year? What is your soil and climate like? To my mind permaculture is not something that comes out of a box ready made, it is a design system. Without knowing the constraints and assets you have it is difficult to give a simple answer.
Mine would be - 'feed the soil not the plant'. Take a look at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fp0d6vVzQ8 ; a quick excerpt from the Master Gardener course at Wheaton labs for some interesting pointers.

These are good points.  I've been slowly building my organic gardening skills over decades, our current garden has been in for 18 years.  We have become more and more "permie" in our approaches, and this year our main goal is to focus on companion planting and intercropping, and we're adding two more beds (one part-shade veggie, one for fruiting shrubs) - which has required me to step up my garden planning a bit.  Thus, using this app (our ADHD brains really appreciate a little support in organizing our time, especially).

I'd like to use this "app" as more of a guide than a hard and fast recipe, but to aid in that endeavor I'm interested in translating what they say into more sustainable practices.  For example, one of the comments above referenced slow release vs. quick feed, and also commented on the variations in quality of composts.  I think my take home from that is that compost is great, and for the recommended "standard fertilizer" to-do list item, I might try a compost or worm tea, commercial organic fertilizer, or just ignore that recommendation and go straight compost.  

If a garden is lacking something, fertilizer can help in the short term. Easy to substitute a natural product for a fertilizer.
If you want a quick-acting nitrogen/phos boost, use milk! Or coffee grounds. Or chicken manure.
Slower, but still rather fast is cow, sheep or horse manure. I can buy dehydrated manure at my local farm/garden store.
Fertilizers are great when you have no other options. I use them very little these days. Have a hundred pounds in bags in the shed that have not been touched in 2 years.

Depends on your current soil, your goals, and you attitude or patience. If the soil is pretty decent and you are not in a hurry, why bother with fertilizers? Even very poor soil will respond to compost or manure if you give it a chance.

Compost is a soil amendment, which adds organic matter to soil along with a small amount of NPK. It varies, but individual values of Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium are lower by unit of compost (in comparison to a similar amount of organic/inorganic fertilizer). In addition, the nitrogen and phosphorus are not as readily available to the plants. In other words, it releases the nitrogen and phosphorus to the plants slowly over time rather than all at once. If compost has a NPK of 2-1-2, for example, that means that for every 100 lbs of compost, you have 2 lbs of nitrogen, 1 lb phosphorus, and 2 lbs potassium (source 1). A chemical fertilizer might be 10-10-10, having 10 lbs each of nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium for 100 lbs of fertilizer.
If we want 2 lbs each (source 2) of NPK per 1000 ft^2 of garden, we would need 100 lbs of compost and something to add a bit more phosphorus (perhaps rock phosphate or fish fertilizer). If compost weighs 1,000 lbs/yard^3 (source 3), then you need about .1 yards^3 (2.7 ft^2) of compost per 1,000 ft^2. To improve the soil, I would start any new garden beds with more compost and add less as time goes on as the soil improves.
I would pair compost with cover crops (either you cover your soil or nature will) to have ground cover at any time in the year and to prevent erosion. This can add soil organic matter, nitrogen, dig for nutrients, aerate soil, etc. depending on what cover crop you grow. In addition, you can add shredded leaves to the soil for a boost in fungal activity when the leaves drop in the Fall. I would emphasize the importance that you don't export soil nutrients and instead compost what you can for your garden. I just behead (cut the plant off its roots, leave the roots to decay and add aeration/organic matter to soil) and shred the spent tomato vines, corn plants, etc. The shredded plants are then put back onto the soil and I use crop rotation as not to harbor the same pests/deplete the same nutrients from year to year.
Compost is acidic, which some plants like. If your soil gets too acidic or you are growing plants that need alkaline soil, use lime or wood ash to raise the pH. If the opposite problem occurs, sulfur can be used to lower the pH quickly or compost over time.

1: https://www.sunset.com/garden/garden-basics/crash-course-fertilizers
2: https://extensionpubs.unl.edu/publication/g945/na/html/view
3: https://www.canr.msu.edu/uploads/236/79117/Compost_for_Midsize_FarmsQuickCourse8pgs.pdf

Thom Bri wrote: Easy to substitute a natural product for a fertilizer.

I dry and finely crush our egg shells and use them in my potting mix and spread on top of the soil, knowing that they will gradually be washed in and covered.

Perhaps I see the effects more now that my current gardens are small and not for market, but I find that many nutrient needs can be met with dilute urine, compost, and wood ash.

Alder Burns wrote:... I find that many nutrient needs can be met with dilute urine, compost, and wood ash.

I have read that except in specific geological conditions, a healthy soil biome will release/transport all the things plants need and that adding artificial high density "plant junk food" to the mix, like commercial fertilizer, interferes with the relationship between microbes and plants, damaging the system. This may be why Alder's finding he doesn't need to do much... I'm betting you feel you have pretty healthy soil, sir?

https://permies.com/wiki/redhawk-soil

Healthy soil that does the work for us so we don't have to waste money buying temporary treatments.

Nigel Palmer’s “Regenerative Grower’s Guide to Garden Amendments” is a great resource:

https://www.chelseagreen.com/product/the-regenerative-growers-guide-to-garden-amendments/?gad_source=1&gbraid=0AAAAAD-HT7QoeRSUNkUX5t2mLAfcBJE5W&gclid=Cj0KCQiAq-u9BhCjARIsANLj-s2vMEoVXJycB-P6VxmKaEyWWTMfc9tujQ4xZM1fNMIfef_gZAXR02EaAhWREALw_wcB

I use many of these extracts and ferments in foliar compost teas.