Gardening Is Good for the Environment

Protecting the environment should be one of the most important things we do in our lives. For those of us who garden we have a chance to make a big impact on the environment; in a positive or negative way. The methods and procedures we use directly impact ourselves, our neighbors and the planet. The idea is to, at least, leave as small a footprint as we can and, at best, give back to the planet.

Use non-toxic fertilizers with no harmful chemicals such as organic manure - this may sound horrible, but it's so much better than harmful chemicals. I believe you can also get organic pesticides, but you can trap slugs using pools of beer, kill aphids with ladybirds and so on.

The best way to insure we give back and protect the environment is to compost. Recycling garden waste is a wonderful method to grow more soil. Instead of creating more fill for dumps, composting is a very useful method for protecting the planet.

With the use of compost in our garden we cut down on many products that are man-made and take away from precious resources this old globe. Compost allows us to use much less, if any, non-organic fertilizers. It makes our plants healthier which reduces the need for chemicals to control weeds, insects, and disease.

Growing your own flowers, vegetables, and herbs, in the most environmentally sound way, cuts down the need for bad practices to provide us with those products which are fresher, healthier for us and impact the environment in the least negative way. The whole idea of any yard or garden is to make it useful in the most useful way and in such a way that the environment is impacted the least or even made better.

Plant a tree or two - this will help use up quite a large amount of CO2 and replace it with oxygen, which I'm sure you'll agree is more useful. They also look attractive, and if you buy a fruit tree, then you can get fruit too!

Obviously this depends on the size of your garden and where you live...but anything leafy will do. Don't have a garden? Buy a houseplant. Don't have a house? Plant a flower in someone's garden. I'm sure they won't mind...just don't let them see you. And you didn't hear it from me.

Replace the gasoline lawnmower with a cordless battery or electrical model without using fuel. We can all practice ways to help our planet. It's not only good for us. It's good for everyone.

Happy gardening!

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Organic Fertilizers - Have Their Drawbacks!

There is a lot of confusion on what truly can be designated an organic fertilizer. An organic fertilizer contains nutrients that have been derived, in one manner or another, from an organism. As an example, organic fertilizers may be manufactured from cottonseed meal, an emulsion derived from fish, animal manure, sewage sludge, and bone meal or a combination of some or all of the aforementioned items.

Some fertilizers that call themselves organic are made from Urea, which is made from inorganic products hence at best it is a synthetic organic fertilizer.

If a product is sold as a fertilizer in North America, it must state the NPK (nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium) formulation on the package. In order to avoid having to guarantee a NPK of a product, many manufacturers will sell their fertilizers as soil conditioners. A soil conditioner does not have to state the nutrient formulation of the product. One of the reasons that manufactures do not want to state a guaranteed nutrient formulation is that with organic products the nutrient levels vary dramatically from batch to batch. Organic products that are made from sewage sludge and manures will only have small amounts of nutrients present in the formulation.

Some organic fertilizers are fortified in order to bring up the nutrient levels and to allow the manufacturer to maintain a guaranteed level of formulation.

Organic fertilizers work best in moist warm soils as it is the organisms in the soil that breakdown the fertilizer which is what releases the nutrients into the soil. Because an organic fertilizer must be broken down in order for it to provide any nutrients to the soil, organic fertilizers are classified as very slow release and a gardener must determine if a slow release is what any specific plant variety might need.

It is also important to understand the side effects of the organic fertilizer. As an example, cottonseed meal is acidic. If you are growing plants such as azaleas or rhododendrons, an organic fertilizer derived from cottonseed meal may be the exact product you are looking for. The common formulation for cottonseed meal is 7-3-2.

With an organic fertilizer such as blood meal, derived from the blood of cattle, one must be cautious because it has a very high nitrogen content and if not used carefully can easily burn plants.

Organic fertilizers have there place in the garden, but they are no different than synthetic fertilizers in the fact that you must understand the formulation of the product and how it might negatively affect the specific plants that you are trying to enhance.

Read and follow the manufacturers instructions and guidelines before usage! For additional information on organic fertilizers, follow the link.

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