Alfalfa is a grain type fertilizer (as opposed to animal parts). The grain type fertilizers go on at a rate of 10-20 pounds per 1,000 square feet. When you start adding blood meal or fish meal, then the rate goes down quickly. If you were going to use those, I would suggest just supplementing a grain fertilizer by mixing no more than 10 pounds into a 50-pound bag and applying at 10-20 pounds per 1,000.

I know this is more than you asked for but blood meal is considered a hot fertilizer. If you get too much you can burn the roots of the plants, but if you can get just a little applied, it can give you a quicker green-up than the grains can. It is the difference between 3 weeks for grains and 3 days for blood meal. When you start to apply something at 1 pound per 1,000 it becomes very hard to control. Thus if you can mix a small amount of blood meal into a large amount of something else and apply, then you can get a better distribution of the fertilizer.

This is the label from the rabbit food. I think everything looks ok but I am a little concerned with the vegetable oil. Will this clog the stomata on the grass?

Ingredients: Dehydrated Alfalfa Meal, Wheat Middlings, Soybean Hulls (10%), Soybean Meal, Feeding Oatmeal, Cane Molasses, Vegetable Oil, BrewerS Dried Yeast, Saccharomyces Cerevisiae Fermentation Solubles, Dl-Methionine Minerals and Vitamins

You may already know this, but food labels (and I'm assuming this holds true for animal feeds as well) are usually labelled in "diminishing sequence" (sorry - can't think of a better term to use). Using the label above, vegetable oil is #7 on the list, which would mean that there's greater amounts of the previous 6 ingredients. Since #3 is Soybean Hulls, and even that's only 10%, I would have to say it's pretty minimal amounts. (Imagine less than 10% of your 50lb bag spread out over your whole lawn).

The other thing to consider is how the pellets break down. It's not a foliar spray, and if my sophomore biology isn't failing me, the stomata would be located on the leafy part of the plant to help them "breathe". The pellets, by the time they break down and any veggie oil is 'released', are just about sitting on the ground (unless you have a carpet-like lawn that's cut short (2" or less)).

But the short answer is - IMHO, no, it won't affect it. But I'd be interested to other's thoughts - is vegetable oil a common ingredient? (Bonding agent?) Does it have a protein value?

Gags

Just to add to what gags said: Oils are absolutely no problem. Unless you are dumping a grease pit onto the lawn, the microbes can deal with it. When an animal dies in the wild, it falls to the ground. There it decomposes - Hair, skin, fat, muscle, bones, organs, etc. Of course animals are most often eaten by carnivores, but the soil can handle most anything that gets left over.

Thanks for the replies.