Tap to Read ➤

Natural Lawn Fertilizers

Sonia Nair
Like other plants in your yard, lawn grass too needs feeding; but the fertilizers must be safe for your kids, pets, and above all, the environment. Here is a brief overview about natural lawn fertilizers.
Every plant needs nutrients for a healthy growth, and this applies for the grass in your lawn. Unlike other plants, all types of grass, including lawn grass, lose nutrients due to normal wear and tear caused by human or animal activities. Mowing also damages to the grass.
Moreover, mowing also causes some damage to the grass. This has to be compensated by using sufficient amount of fertilizers. Hence, feeding is vital, as far as the maintenance of your lawn is concerned.
However, you should be careful while selecting the right lawn fertilizer, because it can cause harm to your kids and pets. Otherwise too, natural fertilizers are always better than the chemical ones.

Benefits
Though, there are so many commercial preparations in the market; more and more people are opting natural or organic lawn fertilizers, which are chemical-free. These chemicals, found in conventional fertilizers, can harm every living organism which interacts with them.
The same happens to the microbes in the soil, which are necessary for a healthy growth of plants. These microbes help the plants in absorbing nutrients from the soil. They play an active role in breaking down the nutrients in the soil, to a form, which is suitable for absorption by the plants.
These organisms undertake aerating of the soil, reducing chances of pest attack and diseases in the plants. Natural lawn fertilizers do not cause harm to these microbes, at the same time, add nutrients to the soil and enhance the plant health.

Some Organic Lawn Fertilizers
There are many natural products, that have been used as natural lawn fertilizers. They include seaweed extract, manure, and compost. Others are crab shells and fish emulsion. Fish emulsion is very popular, as it is made from parts of fish, a rich source of trace elements needed for the healthy growth of plants.
Apart from adding nutrients to the soil, crab shells are also useful in pest control. Seaweed extract helps in the growth of plants, and triggers blooming too. They contain more than 60 nutrients and many amino acids.
With the advent of newer technologies, the application of natural lawn fertilizers has also been made simpler. The earlier versions were to be applied to the soil, but the latest liquid fertilizers can be sprayed through spray canisters.
The best time to apply a lawn fertilizer is warm climate, which makes it easy for microbes to break down nutrients. Some of the natural fertilizers are very expensive. This problem can be tackled by homemade lawn fertilizers, made from easily available household items.
One such fertilizer is compost, made of decomposing plant matter and kitchen waste; but while using compost, make sure that some protein source is included. A natural lawn fertilizer is considered the best, if applied in ideal conditions, and in the right proportion.
According to some studies, such fertilizers are far more effective than the conventional ones.