Each of these nutrients is equally important to the pant, yet each is required in vastly different amounts. These differences have led to the grouping of these essential elements into 3 categories: primary (macro) nutrients, secondary nutrients and micronutrients.

3 of the nutrients are taken up from either air or water — those are carbon (C), hydrogen (H) and oxygen (O). The remaining 13 nutrients are taken up from the soil.

Primary nutrients

NITROGEN

• Necessary for formation of amino acids, the building blocks of protein
• Essential for plant cell division, vital for plant growth
• Directly involved in photosynthesis
• Aids in production and use of carbohydrates
• Affects energy reactions in the plant

PHOSPHOROUS

• Involved in photosynthesis, respiration, energy storage and transfer, cell division and enlargement
• Promotes early root formation and growth
• Improves quality of fruits, vegetables, and grains
• Vital to seed formation
• Helps plants survive the harsh winter conditions
• Increases water-use efficiency
• Speeds up maturity

POTASSIUM

• Carbohydrate metabolism and break down and translocation of starches
• Increases photosynthesis
• Increases water-use efficiency
• Essential to protein synthesis
• Important in fruit formation
• Activates enzymes and controls their reaction rates
• Improves quality of seeds and fruit
• Improves winter hardiness
• Increase disease resistance

Secondary Nutrients

CALCIUM

• Utilized for continuous cell division and formation
• Involved in nitrogen metabolism
• Reduces plant respiration
• Aids translocation of photosynthesis from leaves of fruiting organs
• Increases fruit set
• Essential for nut development on peanuts
• Stimulates microbial activity

MAGNESIUM

• Key elements of chlorophyll production
• Improves utilization and mobility of phosphorous
• Activator and component of many plant enzymes
• Directly related to grass tetany
• Increases iron utilization in plants
• Influences earliness and uniformity of maturity

SULPHUR

• Integral part of amino acids
• Helps develop enzymes and vitamins
• Promotes nodule formation on legumes
• Aids in seed production
• Necessary in chlorophyll formation

Micronutrients

BORON

• Essential for germination of pollen grains and growth of pollen tubes
• Essential for seeds and cell wall formation
• Promotes maturity
• Necessary for sugar translocation
• Affects nitrogen and carbohydrate

CHLORINE

• Interferes with P uptake
• Enhances maturity of small grains on some soils

COPPER

• Catalyzes several plant processes
• Major function in photosynthesis
• Major function in reproductive stages
• Indirect role of chlorophyll production
• Increases sugar content
• Intensifies color
• Improves flavor of fruits and vegetables

IRON

• Promote formation of chlorophyll
• Acts as an oxygen carrier
• Reactions involving cell divisions and growth

MANGANESE

• Functions as a part of certain enzyme systems
• Aids in chlorophyll synthesis
• Increases the availability of P and calcium

MOLYBDENUM

• Required to form the enzyme “nitrate reductas” which reduces nitrates to ammonium in plant
• Aids in the formation of legume nodules
• Needed to convert inorganic phosphates to organic forms in the plants

ZINC

• Aids in growth hormones and enzyme system
• Necessary for chlorophyll production
• Necessary for carbohydrate formation
• Necessary for starch formation
• Aids in seed formation