Fertilizer: Soil Food

What is fertilizer?

What do plants need to live? You might just say water and air. But it’s a bit more complicated than that. Plants need carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium to thrive. They can get these elements from the air, the water, and the soil. That’s the ticket: the soil. The soil is where fertilizers come in.

Fertilizers are chemical or organic compounds that promote plant and fruit growth. The fertilizers are often applied directly to the soil, but they can also be applied to plants’ leaves.

Organic fertilizers are naturally occurring compounds of decayed plant and animal matter.

Inorganic fertilizers are manufactured chemicals and minerals. In the case of minerals, inorganic fertilizers are produced by chemically altering naturally occurring things in order to promote plant development.

Organic materials are generally known to improve the health and productivity of soils and plants. They also provide many kinds of nutrients that are essential to plant growth. These organic compounds help increase the abundance of organisms in the soil that provide fungal mycorrhiza – it aids the plants in absorbing nutrients.

The most likely reason you would consider hiring a landscaper to fertilize your property is to improve or sustain your lawn’s overall appearance and health. Grass is not only a nice place for recreation, sunbathing, or barbecuing. Grass sustains animals, and by sustaining animals has historically played a big role in feeding human populations. Grass prevents erosion, keeps down carbon dioxides, produces oxygen, and filters pollutants from the air.

When deciding to fertilize your grass lawn or your garden, you’ll ultimately have to decide between organic and chemical fertilizers:

Organic fertilizer:

It’s non-burning, which means that it does not harm plant life. It can improve the structure of soil, increase its nutrient-holding ability, promote earthworms’ and other soil-organisms’ habitats, and it can buffer the soil from chemical imbalances.

Chemical fertilizer:

It is burning, which means that it could harm plants. Depending on how it’s used and in what quantities, it can pollute the ground water, make the soil toxic, kill soil microbes, deplete the soil, and repel earthworms because of characteristically high levels of nitrogen.

Fertilizer landscapers – what they can offer:

You can choose from a variety of fertilizers: organic, chemical, and mineral.

The landscaper can offer different fertilizers that are designed for new grass, year-round growth, pre-winter, weed control, moss control, flower growth, and water control (that means increasing the availability of water for your plants).

The landscaper may mention numbers given to fertilizers. These numbers have to do with the fertilizer’s percentage of these three elements: nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium. The three elements necessary for plant growth that are not found in the air or in water. Here are a few examples: a fertilizer bearing the numbers 12 – 8 – 10 means that it has 12% nitrogen, 8% phosphorous, and 10% potassium. And 24 – 5 – 12 means 24% nitrogen, 5% phosphorous, and 12% potassium.

Who this is for:

You could be growing a flower garden, a fruit and vegetable garden, or caring for a grass lawn that you hope to be thick, soft, and deep green. Fertilizers can promote healthy plant, fruit, flower, and vegetable growth. A landscaper can work with you to determine which fertilizer will best suit your purposes, your soil, and your soil’s climate.

The benefits and drawbacks of fertilizing:

It’s recognized that organic fertilizers better maintain soil organic matter (SOM) levels.

Chemical fertilizers can have long-term negative impacts on organisms living in the soil, and can hurt the long-term productivity of the soil.

Fertilizing at the wrong time of the year and over-fertilizing can seriously hurt your lawn. You have to learn about the different fertilizers needed for warm-season or cold-season plants. For example, too much nitrogen can harm warm-season grasses if applied to the soil at the wrong time of the year.

It’s recommended that you fertilize no more than three or four times a year.

The bottom line:

Promoting the healthy growth of your garden or lawn takes know-how, planning, and the right choices between organic and chemical (inorganic) fertilizers. A landscaper can offer broad choices in fertilizers based on your needs, your budget, and your lawn’s needs. While some recommend organic over chemical fertilizers, you’ll still want to talk with the landscapers about their recommendations and experience with both types of fertilizers.