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sherrivanz_gw

Year 2 of Organic Lawn...

sherrivanz
16 years ago

I came here last summer as we had moved into a new home in Fort Wayne, IN. We wanted to do all organic - so the seed was laid and we fertilized with alfalfa. Didn't do any weed control (just handpicking). Grass in front did okay - but dogs in back plus heavy rainfall kept the back from coming in nice and thick.

We just did another round of alfalfa fertilizer, and are planning on reseeding bare spots this weekend. We were going to cover the entire lawn w/ compost - should we only do the seeded spots since we did the alfalfa? Our dirt is really heavy clay soil. Plan on aerating this fall.

Any advice for whether we're on track? Anything else/different we should be doing?

Comments (7)

  • skoot_cat
    16 years ago

    Your defiantly on the right track.

    I would apply compost the "entire area". As for feeding, which I learned here is you need to add diversity in your foodweb. Alfalfa is good green matter(bacterial food). Incorporate fungal foods as well to help raise the fungal biomass of your soil. Corn meal is a good fungal food as is soybean meal. Don't be afraid to use different grains throughout the season. The more diverse your grains the more diverse the biology. greenjeans_il

    Last, but defiantly not least:
    Always Mulch Mow high 3-4+" and water deeply 3/4-1" and infrequently.

  • sherrivanz
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    Thanks for the response. We do mow that high already - and water infrequently (if at all- I like to rely on mother nature to do the work for us to the extent possible). We also mulch the grass clippings back onto the lawn. So I think we have all those covered.

    Interesting on the corn. I always thought corn gluten/meal was used as a natural herbicide. Would now be a good time to use that too then (along with the compost)? Or if we compost now should we wait on the corn?

    Also, one last (stupid) question. I see many of you talk about corn or soy use in organic gardening. I'm quite certain that any corn or soy I would get in these parts would certainly have been derived from GMO seed. Doesn't that negate the "organics" of it? Or am I getting way too specific about something that doesn't apply to food-growing? Just curious...

  • dchall_san_antonio
    16 years ago

    In my opinion you are on an organic program when you start using protein sources to feed your soil microbes rather than using ammonium nitrate, ammonium sulfate, magnesium sulfate, potassium sulfate, Weed-B-Gone, Diazanon, and all the other chemicals typically used in the garden. How you interpret the genetic source of your corn meal is up to you.

    Don't get confused with ground corn products. There is ordinary corn meal (aka whole ground corn meal, ground corn, or sometimes cracked corn) and there is corn gluten meal. Ordinary corn meal is a relatively low protein material per pound, but it has a low cost. It has an antifungal quality. Ordinary corn meal, when applied at 10 pounds per 1,000 square feet every other month should keep most turf diseases out of your garden. When used at 20 pounds per 1,000 it will kill most actively growing fungal diseases. Exceptions to the list of fungal diseases it works against include red thread and rust. Otherwise, ordinary corn meal will cause the fungal diseases to die out. I won't get into the details, but the corn meal itself is not hazardous.

    Corn gluten meal has a PREEMERGENT herbicidal quality. Corn gluten meal is the left over dust after the corn has gone through a wet milling process. It is a concentrated form of protein often used in pet food. When used on your lawn to prevent weeds, it is used at a rate of 40 pounds per 1,000 square feet per YEAR. If you used all 40 pounds all at once you would probably have a stinky yard in a few days as the protein gets rank. If you use up to 20 pounds per 1,000 at a time you should be okay. But stand back for some very serious greening and possibly a growth spurt. A normal application of CGM would be more like 10 pounds per 1,000 for regular fertilizing.

    Also be sure with your compost that you apply no more than 1 cubic yard of compost per 1,000 square feet. You will think that is not very much but you really don't need more and more will smother your grass. After you apply it, come back over it with a push broom the sweep the compost off of the grass blades. All your grass blades should be back on top of the compost once you have swept it in. Too many people apply too much compost and it actually kills their lawn. I've seen four yards in my neighborhood over the past few years kill their lawn. Killing it with kindness. And compost is NOT a source of protein as the ground grains are. Compost is more of a source of microbes that have been feeding on the proteins in the compost pile for the past several months. All that food is gone and only the microbes remain. Then need to be fed, so go ahead and fertilize after you put the compost down.

  • skoot_cat
    16 years ago

    Not Corn gluten, Just plain old corn meal, like the stuff you can get at the grocery store. They are considerably different. Corn Meal is very, very mild in terms of a fertilizer but It is very effective at fighting most turf diseases.

    It would not hurt anything to apply the corn meal along with the compost. Personally I would go with Soybean Meal. It has a higher protein content. For my main feedings I like to alternate between mainly Soybean Meal @ 13lbs per 1000 and Alfalfa @ 25lbs/1000. I try to use Corn Meal every other month at 10lbs/1000. You could apply any grains together or separate without fear of harming your lawn. Also, every time I apply grains I spray them with liquid molasses @ 4oz per gallon water to cover 1000sqft. I have sandy soil. With clay soil 2oz/gal water per 1000 would be fine.

    Not a stupid question at all. (You just opened a huge can of worms with that question) Im sure most of the corn and soy are GMO. However I cannot answer your question as I don't have enough knowledge about it. The only suggestion I have is to find Pesticide-free grains if your concerned. Others will be chiming in on this.

    What type of grass do you have?
    How much Alfalfa are you currently applying per 1000sqft?
    Do you have a Pic?

  • fescue_planter
    16 years ago

    On the subject of corn meal being anti-fungal, from what I have read on this board previously, isn't it just a fungal disease inhibitor due to the type of fungus that it does induce? From what I recall it spurs development of the trichoderma (family?) of fungus which is usually good for plant growth and effectively squeezes out disease causing fungus. Either way I think for my first feeding of the year I will apply a mix of 13lb corn meal + 7lb alfalfa / 1000ft as an fungal control and mixed bacterial & fungal food source.

  • morpheuspa (6B/7A, E. PA)
    16 years ago

    (You just opened a huge can of worms with that question) Im sure most of the corn and soy are GMO.

    Yes, you did. ;-) The earliest sources of genetic modification are simple breeding and have been in use pretty much since the advent of agriculture. We still do a vast amount of that today.

    Find a trait, breed it with others that have the same trait, and you start selecting for the trait itself. When a chance mutation enhances the trait(s) you like, it quickly spreads through the population by the selection filter the farmer uses.

    Mostly people mean genetic insertion when they say GMO, where the added gene is from another species or another cultivar of the same species.

    Contrary to popular belief *cough South Park ManBearPig cough* this doesn't produce a mixed organism. It produces an organism that generates an enzyme, etc., that doesn't generally occur in the species. Also contrary to popular opinion, it happens naturally all the time--bacteria of different species trade genes, and viruses inject genetic alterations (much more rarely) for animals. Cladistic diagrams for bacteria have to take that into account.

    For more information, look up horizontal gene transfer. I know the first few sentences of the story, but others tell the whole story better than I ever could.

    One can certainly argue that the production of Roundup-Ready organisms is a bad thing, and it very well may be as it encourages the overuse of pesticides. Only you can decide if that's acceptable.

    The core of the argument is that if you're looking for non-GMO stuff, you'd better have a time machine and head back to the Stone Age. Ever since we started saving the largest, nicest grain to plant we've been modifying the genome of every plant we use.

    No less have we modified our lawns. All three cultivars in my lawn are heavily bred and selected for specific traits.

  • dllfb
    16 years ago

    What kind of compost do you spread? Is it very fine????

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