Ecological Gardening Practices
Part 5 Using Natural Fertilizers

‘Adopt the pace of nature’ - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Over the past month, we have covered several eco-gardening topics: discover your ecoregion, growing the right plants, keeping your soil covered, and attracting beneficial insects. But if you implement all these practices but are still using synthetic fertilizers, weed killers, and pest controls on your lawn and in your landscape, you are basically shooting yourself in the foot, negating all your positive efforts. 

Most synthetic products can damage the beneficial microorganisms in the soil. If your soil is healthy, its teaming with beneficials that are doing all the work that a fertilizer would do. They help convert nitrogen from the air into the soil making it a usable form of food to the plants. They help decompose dead plant matter into what the plants need. By continually using synthetic fertilizers on our lawns, edible gardens, and landscapes, we lose this important natural ecosystem, and the plants come to depend on us. This makes more work for us!

Here are alternatives that mimic a natural ecosystem . . . 

1. Leave the leaves where they fall. Just like in a forest, the fallen leaves feed the soil microbes and nourish the plants.  There are pros and cons to mulching them vs. leaving them whole. Perhaps mulch those that fall on the lawn which allows them to break down faster and feed the turf slowly. Leave the leaves in the ornamental beds where they act as a natural mulch saving you a lot of money, and they feed the soil as they break down.  
2. Turn those leaves into black gold by composting them and applying to the gardens in fall, spring, and just before planting a new vegetable crop. 
   
3.  Chop & Drop. As you cut back dead foliage of perennials this spring, cut them into short pieces and leave them right there. This uses the plant to basically feed itself. 
   

  
Other options: 

1. Use decomposed chicken manure or other animal manure as compost. 
2. Make a liquid compost tea or a plant tea using comfrey. Learn more here.
3. Use fish emulsion as a foliar spray to feed the plants or as drench to feed the soil. This is great option for in the vegetable garden. 
4. Grow a cover crop. 

As we make the switch from synthetic to natural, we must realize that we can’t rush Mother Nature. Natural pest solutions and fertilizers take time. They work, but they work on their own time table because they are establishing a healthy ecosystem. In a culture that wants to see results quickly (think same-day Amazon delivery), we need to ‘adopt the pace of nature’, slow down, and let nature do the work for us.

If the thought of giving up a green, perfect lawn is something you just can't do cold turkey, then consider easing your way into a more natural approach. Here are three tips:
 
     1. Switch to a natural lawn fertilizer like Milorganite. Apply it in the spring or ideally in the fall. 
     2. Fertilizer less frequently. 
     3. Reduce the size of your lawn and add native plants. This will reduce the amount of fertilizer and water inputs right away!  

That wraps up our eco-gardening series. If you want to learn more, mark your calendars for Saturday, March 23. Naturalist, Beth Goeppinger will be here presenting ‘Planning Your Native Landscape’.  You can also check out the links below. 

LINKS: 
Homegrown National Parks
Native Plant Finder
Natural Fertilizers to Improve Garden Soil

​

Finally, plant for wildlife. This movement is becoming stronger as more people become aware of the benefits of protecting pollinators from the many dangers they face. Grow plants that attract them and avoid using chemicals as much as possible. Natives are a good place to start.  Intention: Plant a pollinator garden. First step: Find a list of pollinator plants and seek them out.   
​
Whether you try these intentions or not, hopefully you are thinking about the growing season that lies ahead and the possibilities it holds. As you do, you awaken the gardener within. ​

Tracy Hankwitz is a horticulturist and general manager at Burlington Garden Center. For a list of pollinator plants and blue flowers to start from seed, go to www.burlingtongardencenter.com.
​