Organic Fertilizers for Healthy Abundant Plants

An old wives’ recipe for healthy tomato plants is often confused with an old wives’ remedy for swollen ankles. Epsom salts, when added to the bottom of a pit dug for tomato starts, then mixed with mulch and soil, ensures an abundant crop of thriving tomato plants. Fish emulsion mixed with compost and scratched into the soil around roses with a top sprinkling of bone meal, encourages healthy growth of foliage and buds, which keep aphid infestations to a minimum. Coffee grounds tossed into the compost bin or sprinkled around the garden also improve soil quality and increase the abundance and longevity of flower blossoms. Berry plants enjoy crushed egg shells sprinkled around the base of plants. Pepper plants also enjoy epsom salts as they are closely related to tomato plants.

An Old Wives’ Rule of Thumb for Organic ‘Fertilizer’ Application

A rule of thumb for adding these remedies to the soil of existing plants is to fertilize around the base in a circle almost the same diameter as the plant’s foliage. For example, a wide rose bush would have a circle of fish emulsion, coffee grounds, compost, and crushed egg shells around its base forming a ring that is just below the outer reach of its main branches. The circle of fertilizer around a 3 1/2′ wide rose bush would probably be 2 1/2 – 3′ across. This is because the root ball (the most concentrated area of root) will branch out and enjoy these nutrients as they seep down through the soil from the ring above.

Flower bulbs benefit from bone meal sprinkled into the planting hole and then again on top where the plant will blossom after planting. It is also a good idea to sprinkle bone meal again in the fall after all bulbs have blossomed, strengthening plants as they die back into the bulb for the winter to grow, with this stored nourishment, again in the spring.

Cottage Garden Compost ‘Recipes’

Well rotted chicken manure is a favorite of gardeners who grow vegetables as it often aids in the growth of ‘monster-sized’ vegetables. Vegetarians who don’t want their vegetables grown in animal waste can try mushroom compost as it has a very nutrient rich loam that fosters quick and steady growth. Leaf mulch is also a good compost and can be made from fall leaves in the yard. A compost bin is required and proper attention to turning compost to decompose stubborn leaves is necessary.

These cottage garden remedies also make great compost bin additives:

• coffee grounds
• tea leaves
• citrus peels
• apple cores
• crushed egg shells
• Meat, pet manure, and grass clippings should be not be added to compost bins, unless the grass clippings can be certified organic – not treated with pesticides or herbicides like dandelion killers.

For information about growing and serving organic eggplant – from seeds to the table – read Organic Eggplant a Tuscan Recipe, also written by Kara Smith