Does a natural organic "fertilizer" exist?

[Mama Soltera]

A store bought kind, I mean. I'm wondering because everyone is telling me to use one (just your average store bought kind that is not natural at all) and I want to see if there is an alternative (besides manure, which I don't have access to).

[kittywitty]

If you have a walmart, you have access to composted manure. Otherwise, I use bonemeal and blood meal and I got liquid seaweed and liquid fish emulsion from...home depot, I believe. They work wonderfully.

[Mama Soltera]

I don't go to Walmart. I do have a Home Depot though. I had no idea they carried those things. Thank you very much for responding. Is there any powder (or is it rock?) like the boxes of fertilizer they have, but natural?

[cschick]

Originally Posted by Mama Soltera

I don't go to Walmart. I do have a Home Depot though. I had no idea they carried those things. Thank you very much for responding. Is there any powder (or is it rock?) like the boxes of fertilizer they have, but natural?

Bloodmeal is dried and powdered blood (cow's blood, I believe) while bonemeal is powdered bone. Bloodmeal a nitrogen source and bonemeal a calcuim source. They're generally available in the garden sections of any stores right now, even Target around here sells them. They come in boxes and are generally with the other fertilizers.

If I'm going to use bloodmeal, I like to incorporate it into the soil a while before I actually plant. For example, I turned the soil maybe a month ago and incorporated the standard amount of bloodmeal for the garden size. That way there's really little of a chance you're going to burn your plants with too much nitrogen.

[MAMom]

I'm wondering about this as well. I've been using the Espoma products (Garden Tone, Plant Tone, Rose Tone, etc.). They also carry many other things, including bone meal, dried blood, cottonseed meal, etc. I buy it at my local garden shop, but I think I've seen it in some of the larger chain stores as well.

They are labeled as "organic" and "organic traditions", but my understanding is that they are not "certified organic", but are natural. I'd love to hear what others have to say about the products, especially for organic veggie gardening.

And, does anyone know for certain if the company has Monsanto ties? I searched and could not find any info that they do, but want to be sure.

Thanks!

[mrs_mandolini]

Espoma's "tone" products, at least 5 years ago when I used to sell them, contained some organic ingredients, but also contained standard chemical fertilizer. If you just buy one of the organic ingredients, you're good.

Eliot Coleman (nationally famous organic grower) uses a fertilizer that's an equal mixture of blood/ cottonseed/ alfalfa meal, greensand, and rock phosphate or bone meal. I use this mix and have good luck with it. All items can be purchased at a garden center, even big box stores often have them.

[MAMom]

Originally Posted by mrs_mandolini

Espoma's "tone" products, at least 5 years ago when I used to sell them, contained some organic ingredients, but also contained standard chemical fertilizer. If you just buy one of the organic ingredients, you're good.

Can you help me understand how to figure this out from the ingredients list? For example, the garden tone says:
Derived from: Hydrolyzed Feather Meal, Pasteurized Poultry Manure, Cocoa Meal, Bone Meal, Alfalfa Meal, Greensand, Humates, Sulfate of Potash, and Sulfate of Potash Magnesia, and then a bunch of beneficial microbes.

which all sounded non-chemical to me. Am I missing something that is chemically-derived, or do you think they may have just changed the ingredients?

[mrs_mandolini]

The ingredients have changed! So has the label, it didn't used to say "For Organic Gardening" like it does now. I stand corrected!

[mrs_mandolini]

Now I'm going to have to pull out my 7-year old bag of bulb-tone and tell you what USED to be in it.. I'll keep you posted if I find it. ;-)

[Mama Soltera]

I found one. It is this brand:

http://www.ebstone.org/ebstone.php

The ingredients are bonemeal, bloodmeal, alfalfa meal, composted chicken manure, potash, feathermeal, and bat guano! (not in that order though). It looks good to me and I will plan on being very careful when I use it.

[LeahBoo]

I have a pet Chinchilla. I use his poo . It's like rabbit, doesn't need to be composted. And there's lots of it.

[Grace and Granola]

I was just at walmart, home depot and lowes and they all had bags of compost manure.

[lunarlady]

I bought my organic fertilizer at Ace Hardware. They had quite a selection, and it seems that everywhere is doing organic now. I even saw Organic Miricle Grow! The only issue with the for organic/from organic issue is that the items that are for organic can contain ingredents that are not from an organic sourse, like blood meal from non-organic animals. From organic sources means that the source of all the ingredents is also orgainic. These are more expensive for the obvious reasons.

[JessicaS]

I have rabbits. They like to poo

[Owen'nZoe]

Originally Posted by abimommy

I have rabbits. They like to poo

This is exactly why I want a rabbit or a guinea pig for our next pet. I had several rabbits growing up, and our gardens were bea-u-ti-ful.