Gee Whiz... Why buy fertilizers?

[EdwardH]

During the middle ages, most towns in Europe used to have barrels placed along streets so that guys could pee into them. The urine was usually used for cleaning. The main ingredient was the ammonia which formed from the urea. Human waste has been used in agriculture for many centuries so nothing new here. In fact many tribes around the world used human poop as a fuel for fires as there isn't enough or wood to burn.

[Phoenix238]

I'm sure the burning smell was lovely!

[fredman]

I asked a well known bonsai master in the USA for his opinion and this was his response....

"Unless someone can improve on what our goals are when we supplement the availability of plants' nutritional needs, let's accept the following as the ideal":

Ideally, we would work toward ensuring that all the nutrients plants normally secure from the soil are in the soil solution at all times, in the ratio at which the plant actually uses the nutrients, and at a concentration high enough to ensure no deficiencies yet low enough to ensure the plant isn't impeded in its ability to take up water and the nutrients dissolved in water.

"In order to achieve this goal, we need to know what our urine contains. and particularly whether or not it contains chemicals we would rather not have finding their way into our bodies. It's probably a safe bet to assume there would be some N, P, K, Ca, Mg, and S, but we're not going to know how much of these nutrients are present, which is a disadvantage if we choose to use it. Also, we don't know about its ability to supply the minor elements. Which leads to the point that if we decide to use urine as a fertilizer, in order for our nutritional supplementation to be ideal, using a second fertilizer or a list of nutrients other than urine will be required. IOW, it's probably not a good idea to depend on urine alone as your supplementation program in its entirety, which begs the question, "So what do we do now? What do we use to compliment our nutritional supplementation w/o creating limitations either by way of deficiency or excess (toxicity). We can't know unless we know what we supply in the urine (or fish tank water or pond water ......)

If we use a second fertilizer to supplement the urine, unless we know what's IN the soil AND what we're providing, the potential for the program to be limiting far outweighs the potential for benefits when comparing regimens of urine application vs a complete and balanced soluble synthetic fertilizer.

So, if you're going to supplement with another fertilizer, why not eliminate urine's potential limitations and choose a soluble synthetic that has ALL the essential nutrients in a soluble form, the ratio of which closely matches that at which the plant actually uses the nutrients?

If, in order to simply SAY you use urine as a fertilizer, you must accept the limitations inherent in its use, limitations easily avoided, it doesn't make sense to travel that trail"


I guess I'll pee in the watering can only in an emergency.

[NAHamilton]

Probably for the best Fredman. Living in Wellington it'll get blown all over your feet anyway

[fredman]

HaHa that's also true

[Rintar]

an older study from 2011 on the npk etc of an average.. http://permaculturenews.org/2011/11/27/ ... -npk-loop/

[Brian]

Friedman, Sorry don't agree with your American bonsai masters comments.

There are countless stories of using urine as liquid fertiliser ( I am an advocate ) if you do a simple google search. My trees are flourishing with a weekly dose.

[Isitangus]

For those that plan on using their own urine as a fert maybe the first step should be formal urinalysis through your go to make sure there's no nasties. If you paid for it I'm sure you could request a breakdown of npk levels also.
One thing I will comment is there is a big difference in quality and types of research, just because someone writes an article doesn't make it right or wrong.
For me unless there's a double blind, random control, study, I'll read it but not give the articles too much merit.


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[fredman]

There is no doubt in my mind that it is a fertilizer in its own right. The problem for me is using it in a container culture. I want to give my plants all majors and minors in a balanced form, to ensure maximum growth and minimum problems from lack of nutrients.
My concern is there are to many unknowns and variables to use that on a regular basis in a container. Especially if you take it seriously like we do. Nothing wrong with using it as a supplement now and again. Different story in the garden.......
I always had that in the back of my mind, but didn't really thought it through properly.