Organics are in the Air: What’s that smell?

http://soilsalive.com/When it 's time to feed the landscape, you may notice signs like these along the Katy Trail. Here at Soils Alive, we take care of organic fertilization for the trail, as well as natural pest control.

Using organic material we collect locally, we make our own organic compost. With that organic compost, we then create our own liquid compost extract. What is liquid compost extract exactly? Liquid compost is our most advanced organic application. Better than compost tea, liquid compost is a super nutrient-dense concentrate of the most beneficial elements of our high-grade compost. Containing both minerals and an abundance of naturally-occurring live elements, liquid compost is the closest thing to compost in a liquid form. It is one of the most powerful fertilizers we can use on your lawn and landscape. This is what we apply along the Katy Trail.

Another component of our fertilizer program is fish emulsion from our aquaponics system. Aquaponics is typically used as a sustainable food production system that combines conventional aquaculture (raising aquatic animals) with hydroponics (growing plants in water). In an aquaponic system, toxins that typically build up in the water are filtered by the plants growing in the system. Clean water is then recirculated back to the animals. The waste produced by the fish in the system makes a wonderful additive to our organic fertilizer.

So if you were wondering why you sometimes get a whiff of something “organic” in the air, what you're probably smelling is the liquid compost with fish emulsion. While organic fertilizers can often have an initial odor to them, they dissipate quickly; and the benefits to the landscape are well worth tolerating the potential odor for a short period of time. If you have any questions about organic fertilizers or how we use them to care for lawns and landscapes around Dallas and Fort Worth, drop us a line HERE.