another member posted in another thread spreading cofee ground over the grass and let it rain itself in. He claims lush green growth shortly after..
plus i hear worms absolutely LOVE coffee grounds
if you spread it, they will come

The organic lawn fertilizers that I have bought in the past worked well.

My compost is waaaaaaay too precious to use on the lawn.

I have used various brands. They have contained such things as alfalfa, chicken feathers, and soy meal.

Putting any fertilizer on your soil without getting organic matter into the soil does the same thing as using any synthetic fertilizer. If your soil is sand without that organic matter the nutrients will not be held in the soil but will be washed out with the water and pollute the ground water. If you soil is clay with little to no organic matter in it the nutrients will be latched onto the caly particles and will not be available to the plants. So adding "fertilizer" of any kind without also getting the level of OM up is counterproductive.
All of the places I have been in Indiana I see tons of potential organic matter everywhere and can believe that most of it gets raked up, bagged up, and tossed into a landfill just like here in Michigan and that can be used as a source of OM and more often than not it is free. Those leaves, mulch mowed into the turf work very well. The grass clippings, mulch mowed back into the turf, provides 1/2 the nutrients the grass needs annualy and raises the level of organic matter in the soil. A big mistake most people make is that they have to buy whatever they use on their lawn or in there garden and it simply is not true.

Ditto what Kimm said. Start by mowing leaves into your lawn and let the grass develope on it's own. A little fert won't hurt, but you have to have the basic mechanisms working in the lawn first to get the best results. It takes time.

Alfalfa, wheat Bran, cracked corn or any most any high protein feed grain purchased at feed mills (usually under $6.50 per 50 lbs) should be quite adequate if applied at 20lbs per thousand square feet. I doubt organic fertilizer leaching in sandy soil will be a issue if what I have read in Organic lawncare forums is indeed true, and judging by my results on my sandy soil lawns with organic fertilizer I believe that information is true. Leaving clippings is neccesary at above application rates for great results. At 20 lbs per thousand (every six or seven weeks) and with mulching you will be adding a lot of organic material.

Kimmm and Bill, the organic fertilizers that I have used are MADE completely of the type of ingredients you are proposing. NO chemicals. Just because they come in a bag labeled for lawn and garden use does not make them evil products of the military industrial compleX! Having the word fertilizer on the bag does not turn the contents into petroleum by-products. :-)

Read the labels. If they are 100% composed of ingredients like alfalfa, wheat middlings, cracked corn, soy meal, feather meal, blood meal, etc, they are perfectly fine ORGANIC fertilizers composed of ORGANIC material that will increase the OM content of your soil.

I know, I know. Homemade is better. But I dont have time to sew my own clothes anymore. And I buy organic fertilizers for my lawn.

Use shredded paper, free coffee grounds and your kitchen waste. You can do lasagna gardening and plant in the mulch (the leaves and other stuff being your lasagna layers).

Mama, readsn'writes asked how to make her lawn look better, not about beds, so the lasagne beds won't help her.

Rn'w, I would suggest that you can use any of the organic fertilizers, but, for whatever reason, you can frequently find the meals, etc., at a feed store for less than the cost of a bag of fertilizer - somehow, having someone else mix things up seems to double the cost. If money is really tight, them buying a bag of one this month, and a bag of another next month, might be in your budget. As said at the top of this thread, you need the OM, to feed your plants by feeding the organisms that then live in the soil which make the nutrients, etc. that your plants' roots take up. Since the increase of the microherd is slow, it will take time for great improvements to show. Making compost teas, with molasses added, and spraying them on the lawn, diluted, will greatly help with the microherd. If you can get and spread compost, whether bagged or your own, and also spread the meals, and anything else you can get, as well as using a mulching mower and leaving the clippings on the lawn, and letting the grass gow a bit longer than a "pretty", conventional lawn, then you will see a slow improvement in how the lawn looks, and by next year should see a lot of improvement.

I'm not sure what Kimmsr was trying to say but I can only hope that it wasn't explained all the way. Unless you have done something to kill off your microbes, you have some there already. You might not have the perfect mix of them but you have some. I would just fertilize with an organic material. My favorites are ORDINARY corn meal and alfalfa simply because they are low cost sources of protein. Use them at a rate of 10 to 20 pounds per 1,000 square feet and give it 3 full weeks to show some improvement.

The founder of our local compost giant has used compost on his personal lawn 2 times and the second time he said he didn't need it. Once you are using organic materials and not using any chemicals, the microbes are there. If you really want to do compost but can't afford it, compost tea is the answer for you. Compost tea costs 1,000 times less that compost to cover the same area. So if your compost to cover 1,000 square feet would cost you $30 (plus delivery), the compost tea to cover that area would cost you $0.03.

What KimmSr was saying is iff you do not have adequate levels of organci matter in your soil it makes littel difference which type of "fertilizer" you use you will not be able to benefit from it because your soil won't be able to properly utilize what you put down.
An organic "fertilizer" is okay as long as the part of your soil that is organic matter, that 5 percent or so vegetable waste stuff, is not neglected. Many people mistakenly believe that a single application of a bit of compost or manure is all that is needed and it is not. Organic matter is the single disposable material in your soil and needs to be constantly reeplenished. Conpost tea is a tool to be used in conjunction with other organic matter but will not, and cannot, replace organic matter in the soil. OM is the stuff soil microbes live on, you gots to have it in the soil for them because without OM in your soil you won't have those soil microbes working and doing their thing no matter how much compost tea, or seaweed extract, or lava dust you spray around.
There simply is no replacement for lots of organic matter in your soil.

I'm in the same boat with read n writes with several acres of carpet and centipede grass all in sandy soil. I have been using a broadcast spreader behind the riding mower to apply pellet fertilizers but am curious how any of you have addressed the meal products. Seems like they would be too fine and would clump up in the hopper. Or is that not the case? Maybe I just need to try it.

If grass clippings is considered organic matter, then why isn't natural fertilizers like cornmeal, alfalfa, and coffee grounds isn't?

What a fine link for the Texas Tea Brewer! I have long been astinished at the high price of "store bought" brewers. This is a definite add-on to the Project list, so I can stop coveting foliar feeding w/compost tea & can get on with it & do it! Even have some air pumps in the attic with the old aquariums!
I have been buying the BJs brand of laundry detergent (because it works & is cheap...but mostly because it comes in beautiful 5 gallon buckets w/lids. I mostly use them for weeding & mixing but this is a perect use!

Donna

I have a lawn that for 22 years has never been weeded, fertilized, or given compost. Can I start with putting down "composted cow manure" as that is the only stuff I've found so far? And if so how much do I need for 9000 sq ft of lawn? Would making "tea" from this stuff work? I intend to fertilize with cracked corn but I understand I need to promote my microherd too so suggestions of what I can buy while I set up making some compost in the future would be helpful. Thanks

well we have been using a organic tea for 2 yrs now we have found if you use algae water from are greenhouse and we see new growth in one to two days from last watering and its a large growth not just small leafs

Here is a link that might be useful: saroyah produce