Hello;

My local farm Supply do not have stock of corn meal. They do have whole & cracked corn as well as corn gluten however. Is there a preference?

I understand that Alfalfa pellets are another good source. Anything else I should be considering?

What are natural means to improve aeration in the soil? ( i.e. non-mechanical) Now that Andy had scared me into not wanting to do anything to disturb the soil because of potential lurking POA and other garbage seeds lying dormant in the soil.

On doing core samples I ran into an area that seem to be composed of rocky soil as the probe only goes down 2-3" before it won't go any further. The funny thing about it is that the grass above it is doing well. I was trying to figure out ways to improve the consistency of that and other areas.

Thank-you

Roots are surprisingly adept at getting around (or punching right through) rocks. Small rocks, as part of the soil, usually aren't much issue. I have tons of those and you'd never know it. I still remove them (from the gardens at least) when I dig to put things in.

The big stuff can be an issue, of course.

Cracked corn (1.65-0.65-0.40) is just fine instead of corn meal. Corn gluten meal is used as an organic pre-emergent for weeds, to varying levels of effectiveness depending on who you talk to (I've never tried it).

Alfalfa's (2.5-0.5-2.0) a great source of just about everything as well--I tend to recommend corn for soil conditioning and boosting organics as it's cheaper and huge amounts don't smell when decaying. That's true of alfalfa too, except the expense. On the up side, alfalfa contains root growth hormones.

Soybean meal is my heavy-hitter for feeding as it has good nitrogen (7-1-2 or so). 15 pounds feeds the lawn quite well for a month at least. Soybean's grown right around here, so it's cheap.

Some people love cottonseed meal (7-2.5-1.5). I've never tried it, this isn't cotton country (neither is Ontario but you never know what gets shipped in sometimes). But with those numbers it has great nitrogen levels.

I moved this thread to the organic lawncare forum

The funny thing about it is that the grass above it is doing well.

If it doesn't dry out in Summer and seems to get enough nutrients, don't bother figuring out why. It found a way to do well. Celebrate it.

Corn meal and cracked corn are very lite fertilizers and used more to control fungal problems. Corn Gluten Meal and Soy Bean Meal, and Cotton Seed Meal are the highest protein content or nitrogen.

What do you folks think about Safe N Simple Lawn Food? There's a Tractor Supply company up the road from me and its supposedly carried there although I don't see it on the TSC website. I was thinking of taking a ride over to pick up some horse feed 100% alfalfa pellets and some corn meal and SBM if they have it, in prep for my reno. But this stuff looks like it might be more economical for a 50lb bag if it is good. Any thoughts? Or better to stick with the raw materials?

No objection. Like everything else, the potassium source is added (it is listed on the OMRI list and is technically organic). However, all of the nitrogen sources are organic, so that's good, and it seems to contain an extremely high percentage of soybean meal.

If soy is cheaper, that's a better option. If not, this would be just fine.

Cracked corn will get you a crop of corn going. At least all I have used did. It isn't a problem, a few mowings and its gone, but, you might want to know that.

I love CGM when I can get it cheap enough to compare cost wise with other options, which is rare.

Soybean meal, cottonseed meal and alfalfa are all good organic fertilizers. I have read alfalfa meal has a growth hormone in it and so often use it as my first ferilizer app in the spring.

I kind of switch off on soybean meal and cottonseed meal. On a practical matter, cottonseed meal is usually harder to get to go through a broadcast spreader than soybean meal.

As mentioned elsewhere, I use urea as a last app in the fall on my cool season grass.

I figure a hodge podge rotation (appropriate in amount and timing) probably helps provide a little more balance to the micro herd. ?