Jerry Garcia
Well-Known Member
While perusing my local hydro store last week I picked up a pamphlet from Fox Farm listing their entire lineup of nutrients/soils. While flipping through I came to a page titled "Do your plants know the difference between organic and inorganic fertilizers" and thought I would share it with the community. This is a direct transcription...
Do Your Plants Know The Difference Between Organic and Inorganic Fertilizers?
"Organic fertilizers come directly from nature. For example, our Peace of Mind and Happy Frog fertilizers are made up of ingredients like alfalfa meal, bat guano, and bone meal. Big Bloom, our liquid plant food, contains earthworm castings and Norwegian kelp. And when you dig around in our all natural potting soil, Ocean Forest, you'll find composted forest humus, peat moss, and marine ingredients like crab meal.
When you use organic products in your garden, you are providing the finest ingredients nature has to offer, harvested from all over the globe. These nutrients may be released more slowly, but they'll last longer, too. Because the ingredients are all natural, they provide a rich, well-balanced meal to plants--one that is packed with important, but often overlooked, micronutrients.
Some inorganic fertilizers are simply naturally-occurring minerals that have been treated to make them easier for plants to use. Others may be manufactured in a laboratory. There are a variety of FoxFarm products that contain inorganic ingredients, such as Grow Big, Tiger Bloom, American Pride, Marine Cuisine, Open Sesame, Beastie Bloomz and Cha Ching. When it comes to inorganic fertilizers, quality matters. FoxFarm chooses only the finest ingredients for its family of fertilizers that deliver optimal nutrition for each stage of a plant's growth.
Some people say that the plants cannot tell the difference between an organic and inorganic fertilizer, but the soil can. Remember, soil is alive. It's teeming with microbes, decaying leaves, tiny insects--all the very life that makes plants grow. Organic fertilizers add food to that rich mix. On the other hand, an inorganic mineral fertilizer can give your garden a boost in the same way that concentrated multivitamin can give you the extra nutrition you need. What matters most is that everything you feed your garden must be carefully balanced to deliver the nutrition plants need while avoiding the buildup of salts and other toxins."
What's the Big Deal About Salt?
"Think about the last time you walked through a forest. It was probably cool and damp, no matter what the weather was like when you left your house. That's because trees and other plants are giant water pumps. Water moves through the roots, travels through the stems and leaves, and gets released into the air through a remarkable process known as transpiration. A single maple tree can transpire up to 58 gallons of water per hour. Even an ordinary tomato plant transpires 30 gallons during a growing season.
Water, then, is critical to a plants well-being. Too much salt in the soil can inhibit what we call a plant's "osmotic potential"--it's ability to take up water. just as salty food can make a person thirsty, salty soil can dehydrate a plant. Cheap, poor-quality synthetic fertilizers can create salt build-up in the soil that can cause your garden more harm than good."
Nothing too earth-shattering, but it gives some perspective on the organic/inorganic debate.
Do Your Plants Know The Difference Between Organic and Inorganic Fertilizers?
"Organic fertilizers come directly from nature. For example, our Peace of Mind and Happy Frog fertilizers are made up of ingredients like alfalfa meal, bat guano, and bone meal. Big Bloom, our liquid plant food, contains earthworm castings and Norwegian kelp. And when you dig around in our all natural potting soil, Ocean Forest, you'll find composted forest humus, peat moss, and marine ingredients like crab meal.
When you use organic products in your garden, you are providing the finest ingredients nature has to offer, harvested from all over the globe. These nutrients may be released more slowly, but they'll last longer, too. Because the ingredients are all natural, they provide a rich, well-balanced meal to plants--one that is packed with important, but often overlooked, micronutrients.
Some inorganic fertilizers are simply naturally-occurring minerals that have been treated to make them easier for plants to use. Others may be manufactured in a laboratory. There are a variety of FoxFarm products that contain inorganic ingredients, such as Grow Big, Tiger Bloom, American Pride, Marine Cuisine, Open Sesame, Beastie Bloomz and Cha Ching. When it comes to inorganic fertilizers, quality matters. FoxFarm chooses only the finest ingredients for its family of fertilizers that deliver optimal nutrition for each stage of a plant's growth.
Some people say that the plants cannot tell the difference between an organic and inorganic fertilizer, but the soil can. Remember, soil is alive. It's teeming with microbes, decaying leaves, tiny insects--all the very life that makes plants grow. Organic fertilizers add food to that rich mix. On the other hand, an inorganic mineral fertilizer can give your garden a boost in the same way that concentrated multivitamin can give you the extra nutrition you need. What matters most is that everything you feed your garden must be carefully balanced to deliver the nutrition plants need while avoiding the buildup of salts and other toxins."
What's the Big Deal About Salt?
"Think about the last time you walked through a forest. It was probably cool and damp, no matter what the weather was like when you left your house. That's because trees and other plants are giant water pumps. Water moves through the roots, travels through the stems and leaves, and gets released into the air through a remarkable process known as transpiration. A single maple tree can transpire up to 58 gallons of water per hour. Even an ordinary tomato plant transpires 30 gallons during a growing season.
Water, then, is critical to a plants well-being. Too much salt in the soil can inhibit what we call a plant's "osmotic potential"--it's ability to take up water. just as salty food can make a person thirsty, salty soil can dehydrate a plant. Cheap, poor-quality synthetic fertilizers can create salt build-up in the soil that can cause your garden more harm than good."
Nothing too earth-shattering, but it gives some perspective on the organic/inorganic debate.
... Good read.. thx
