Organic Garden Fertilizer
Using organic garden fertilizers is just
good common sense because they are excellent fertilizers — good for your
plants, good for you and especially good for the
environment.
 According to the EPA, nearly 70% of
pollution in water comes from the agricultural
sector's chemical fertilizers that often leach and cause
soil erosion. Now, even farm growers appear to be the major
culprits regarding the pollution in our waters, it
doesn't mean home
growers are innocent. Farmers have been trying
to make amends by turning to organic growing,
and it's now time that all home gardeners join
the organic bandwagon and use organic garden fertilizers.
The Benefits of Using Organic Garden
Fertilizers
Organic garden fertilizers
utilize organic soil amendments to increase the nutrient
content and soil characteristics of your garden. Organic
gardens have decomposing organic matter that acts as a
natural organic garden fertilizer to supply plants with
nutrients essential for their growth cycles.
Organic
garden fertilizers also help improve and maintain the
structure of garden soil, regardless
of what type. If your garden has the clay type of soil,
organic garden fertilizers are can preserve the tilth and
structure to prevent soil from clumping. It's also a
great aid for maintaining the water-holding capacity of
soil – and especially perfect if your garden is sitting on
sandy soil.
The organic matter in
organic garden fertilizers contains natural
properties that will make micronutrients, such as zinc and
iron, more available to your plants. Using organic garden
fertilizers make you more productively use the
materials that would likely otherwise have been
discarded. Therefore, organic garden fertilizers help you
keep your backyard and the environment free
from chemical pollutants.
Organic Garden
Fertilizers: What’s in the bag?
A good
gardener should know what's in a bag of organic garden fertilizers. Knowing what
nutrient comes from what type of material is a skill to be
learned if you plan to be a home grower.
Plants
need three major nutrients in order to
grow. All — nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus
— are found in organic garden fertilizers. Since
organic materials, from which organic garden fertilizers are
made, don't often have all three nutrients (ex. Manure may be
high in nitrogen but have less phosphate), most suppliers make
up for this by combining and mixing different kinds of
materials.
Alfalfa meal is a green
manure-based organic garden fertilizer preferred by rose garden
owners. With its 3N-1P-2K formulation, this organic garden
fertilizer is an excellent source of nitrogen (N), phosphorous
(P), and potassium (K) for plants. It also contains
the hormone Triacontanol that helps regulate plant
growth.
Another organic garden fertilizer is the
blood meal which has a formulation of 12-2-1.
This fertilizer is a slaughterhouse by-product, and a
great source of quickly available organic nitrogen. For an
excellent calcium and long-lasting phosphorous source, bone
meal organic garden fertilizer may be used. For even better
results, both of these meal organic garden fertilizers can be
mixed and blended together.
Kelp meal
organic garden fertilizer has very high potassium content
levels but zero phosphorus levels. To compensate for the lack
of phosphorous, this organic garden fertilizer may be used in conjunction
with bone meals.
Organic garden fertilizers
can contain several micronutrients and may also lack several
of them. The trick is to know what’s in the
bag.
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