Fertilizer

[Rob K.]

Can anyone recommend a good fertilizer that is chemical free? I'm asking about my personal residence.

I don't have a service come to spray my lawn because I am anti-chemicals. We eat natural and organic food and I avoid prescription drugs and and most other stuff made in a factory. I don't want my kids playing on a lawn that has bad stuff on it. I also have a nice garden that I wouldn't want exposed to any possible danger.

I tried the Jonathan Green type of organic fertilizer and it was very expensive and not very good. Lately, I've been using Milorganite which is very cheap, but not that good either.

If anyone has had good luck with a certain type, please respond. I would appreciate it.

[George P.]

hi rob. what you are trying to get (asking) does not exist. there is no "good organic fertilizer". i do some landscape on the side and i fertilize lawns.

i have spoken to many people like you who try to go the natural way. but when they see that their lawn has weeds and their neighbor's does not, they just give up and get the fert with the chemicals. that's the nature of the game. you either have to lean to live with the chemicals or learn to have a terrible lawn.

as far as "kids playing with bad stuff on it", dont worry about it. unless they eat it, i'd never think about bad things happening.

that's just my opinion though.

[Tara G.]

We spread compost once in a while on the entire lawn, pretty messy work though:-) It isnt enough though, have to supplement it with store bought fertilizers, but probably not as much as our neighbors.. I also spend many a morning/ evening pulling weeds.. Nothing is as relaxing:-) has worked on the zoysia lawn in he backyard, the fescue in the front is still weedy. we will plug with zoysia next summer, I am tired of the water and maintenance fescue needs.. zone 7B.

[Timothy W.]

The most organic solution would be to have rabbits that you feed your grass clippings to and a worm colony in their poop. The worms convert the nitrogen rich rabbit poop into a great organic fertilizer. Not joking.

[Jon Holdman]

By definition fertilizers are chemicals. There are very specific chemicals that plants need to grow. Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium, in particular, but also other elements. These have to come from somewhere. Perhaps you mean organic (from some natural source) rather than inorganic (manufactured.) In general, organic fertilizers (like manure or compost) provide less nutrients than inorganic fertilizers, so what you're seeing is somewhat par for the course. And have their own set of problems. These incidents like e-coli contamination have been traced back to organic sources, in some cases intentional (using manure for fertilizer) in others unintentional (water sources contaminated by runoff from feedlots).

[Dale Osborn]

If you are looking for a good organic fertilizer there is nothing better than cow manure that has been steamed to kill the weed seeds. It does not kill the weeds but will green up the grass. City parks hire goats to come in and eat the weeds. In WA the goats even eat all of the wild blackberry bushes that grow everywhere - thorns & all. A side benefit of using the goats is they add a little more "organic fertilizer" to the grass.

I tried to get zoysia grass started in CO as I was tired of the yellow dead grass of summer. With the 3 foot deep roots the zoysia grass stays green in the summer & it makes a thick mat for choking out weeds. I did not read the dinky print that it takes 3-5 years to establish the plugs. I watched it go for three years without doing anything then in 4th year it sent out a 12 inch runner into the Kentucky bluegrass. I was excited to finally see it moving. Then we had a cold winter and it is not cold tolerant so killed it all off! Guess they are trying to get some started in Canada that is more cold tolerant now.

[George P.]

zoysia sucks and it does not work well in cooler climate. it goes brown around sept/october and it stays that was until june. looks awful.

[James H.]

I don't know what works well in Michigan, but in north Texas, St. Augustine cut on the highest lawnmower setting will keep the weeds out. There needs to be some shading for that grass to work, though.

Likewise, bermuda grass, not popular with everyone, thrives on being cut very short - as short as one inch, but I keep it at 1.5 inches.

So, the cut hieght of the grass can greatly effect the grass's ability to crowd out weeds. You will still have some weeds - but you will even if you use "chemicals".

So now that the weeds are crowded out, the next task is to green it up. Watering deeply only once or twice a week during dry seasons goes a long way to help with that. Also, not letting the grass get too tall before you cut it helps because the bottoms of the blades are usually lighter in color than the top.

Adding iron to the yard is specific to increase green-ness and has little other value. You just have to make sure to apply it to a dry yard and then water shortly afterwards or it will scorch the grass in the hot sun. If you have runoff onto side walks or such, it can stain the pavement orangish red, so be careful.

I am not a landscaper, but this has worked well for me. I don't use the iron as I am mostly concerned with dense and robust grass rather than the darkness of the green. You can throw some agricultural corn meal down to add nutrients. I have in the past and have had good results, but don't use it regularly. I find that it make the grass grow faster wich means I have to mow it more often!

So, you have to select the right grass for your climate and degree of shade (which is why I have different grass in my front yard vs my back yard - shady front, sunny back) and then you just have to give it some time and care. I can't tell you what that would be in Michigan, but usually it boils down to finding out what the most common grass is in your area. It is the most common for a reason.

[Steve Babiak]

Originally posted by George P.:

zoysia sucks and it does not work well in cooler climate. it goes brown around sept/october and it stays that was until june. looks awful.

In the northern climates, for rentals, zoysia is OK. It's not as high maintenance as other grasses, but does have the characteristics that George P points out (brown during winter vs fescue or bluegrass that is green through the winter). And zoysia seems to need less mowing.

[Account Closed]

Inorganic fertilizers do not make a lawn toxic or harmful for you or your children. It's chemical pesticides that have known toxicity. The environmental cost of inorganic fertilizer is in 1) the mining of the chemicals, 2) inorganic chems can can kill microbial life and damage overall soil health, and 3) runoff from lawns and ag with chemicals affects nearby water quality.

I've been an organic gardener for years and don't use any chemical pesticides on anything. But lawns are not natural. We can get rid of them, let them limp along, or add water and nutrients. Lawns are incredibly water and nitrogen needy and it's difficult to feed them enough organically. You may need to rethink what your goal is. I feed my lawn chem. fertilizer a few times year, hand weed it when I notice them getting out of control, and let it go brown when the water bill gets over $200/mo (that's a So. Cal. problem). The right grass in the right location will choke out most weeds, so it really is a question about using chemical fertilizers. Kind of like taking aspirin instead of making your own willow bark extract.

[Rob K.]

Thanks for all the feedback. I'm going to look into this further. Maybe I will break down and use fertilizer in the front yard and leave the back. I don't have a ton of weeds, just more than I would like.

I've heard of a possible link between cancer and commercial lawn fertilizers. Although, there's a possible cancer link with everything.

The weird part is that I have an awesome garden and all I put on it is grass clippings and compost. I throw all vegetable scraps, banana peels, eggshells, etc. into a plastic composter all summer long. In the fall, I spread it out on the garden. The only thing I spray the plants with is a mixture of water, dishwasher soap, and hot sauce. The bugs hate it. In the past, I have put down cow or sheep manure in the spring, but not this year.

I don't get vegetables as early in the season as people that use miracle grow, but when my garden catches up, everything looks as good as theirs or better.

[Steve Babiak]

What I found with my lawn, which was purchased new from builder and seeded, is that wherever weeds were in control I ended up with "soil conditions" that were not conducive to grass roots taking to a sufficient depth. Those "soil conditions" = construction debris of various sorts (bricks, lumber scraps, roof shingles, concrete, foam plates and disposable coffee cups, etc) at very shallow depth. Seed would start to grow, but never last. Still digging up some of this crap a decade later.

And we also get Japanese beetles and the grubs from them. Can kill a lawn in a short time, and the weeds then take over. There is a "natural product" for the grubs called Milky Spore, and I tried it, but it just doesn't work fast enough to keep the lawn from getting destroyed; so it's either use chemical insecticides or the lawn is dead.

[Account Closed]

Originally posted by Rob K:

I've heard of a possible link between cancer and commercial lawn fertilizers. Although, there's a possible cancer link with everything.

Many commercial lawn fertilizers are combination fertilizer/pesticide/herbicide products. If you are looking to get rid of weeds, then you are looking at herbicide and pesticide use. Even the "safest" of these have known toxicity. A really dense lawn that is properly feed and watered will have the least amount of weeds, but won't be weed free without hand weeding or herbicide use.

[Ryan M.]

Zoysia won't work here it looks dead until early summer. I have a service use liquid apps twice a year and it works great. Also go through around 200 gallons of roundup a year, I guess I'm pro chemical.