I think the message as it applies here is that we shouldn't be afraid of using synthetics in lawn care just because they contain chemicals. Just because something has an "ingredient" with a funny looking name that may be hard to pronounce doesn't mean that it's necessarily bad or wouldn't be produced naturally. For example, organic fertilizers can cause chemical run off just like synthetic fertilizers. Somewhat off topic, someone asked me what I was feeding my dog because her fur was so shiny and smooth. This person couldn't believe when I told her that I feed her bagged, dry dog food from the pet store. "All those chemicals and artificial ingredients! It's just not natural!" This person fed her dog a raw diet, and I guess she was assuming that plopping a round of filet mignon into the food bowl was somehow more natural than dog food. To me, that's just as unnatural. (Her dog was also suffering from conditions that may or may not have been related to diet, including terrible fur quality and weak bone issues...) Giving a dog a T-bone is as unnatural as dropping countless pounds of soy meal in a lawn to feed it., just as broadcasting Scotts Lawnfood is equally unnatural to feeding your dog dry kibble. There is nothing natural about a lawn (or farming or gardening, for that matter). There was an entire hoopla about this years ago, which is why the word "organic" is used where "natural" used to be. Lawns do not exist in nature without human intervention. Stop mowing, feeding and weeding the lawn for a single season and you will see my point. In nature, success would be a single seed out of thousands germinating and surviving log enough to produce more seed. In the man made lawn, success is typically 85-90% germination at a minimum, with the constant upkeep to ensure proper care for many years, and the prevention of any grass plants from producing seed. At any rate, I was going for a lighthearted post with that image and not something of serious analysis.

Cupshaped, We lived just south of Daytona for over 20 years. We hadn't discovered OGRs, but gave up on the HTs that were sold at garden centers because they were too much work--the constant spraying required was a nightmare. Especially in the heat of summer, when you'd come in needing a blood transfusion from all the mosquito bites. We were on a barrier island, so the "soil" was almost pure sand with a thin layer of leaf litter and pine straw on top. Water & nutrients ran right through it. We found gardening with Florida natives to be a very satisfying, enviromentally friendly way to go. If you want a Florida native that will attract butterflies, get a firebush (Hamelia patens). Wonderful red-orange tube-shaped flowers are great nectar sources for most butterflies, and hummingbirds like them, too. Being a native, it should perform well--there may be a little freeze damage once in a while in Daytona, but it's good to whack the bushes back once in a while, anyway. Another great Florida native for butterflies is Wild Coffee (Psychotria nervosa). Makes a beautiful rounded bush with shiny leaves, small white flowers, and red berries. Zebra longwing butterflies LOVE it. Citrus trees act as larval food for Eastern Swallowtails (the caterpillars look like bird poop, and put out scary red antennae-type things when alarmed, but the butterflies are GORGEOUS.) The caterpillars don't eat that much, so just ignore the few chewed on leaves and wait for them to emerge in all their flying glory. And you can eat the citrus, too. Passionflower vines are larval food for zebra longwings, and have great flowers. Muhly grass is a lovely ornamental native grass that has pinkish blooms. And some of the spartina grasses are also great native ornamentals. Green Images in Christmas, Florida is a WONDERFUL native plant nursery that's not too far from Daytona. Worth a trip over there, and they should have a bunch of natives that will perform well and bring in the butterflies. Depending on your friends' soil, amendments can be tricky. If they're in a real sandy area, the soil is so coarse that it has tons of air & oxygen in it, and organics burn up so fast that you almost can't add them quickly enough to make a difference. Other places are muck (basically swamp bottom) and have much richer soil. The Florida Native Plant Society is a wonderful organization and a great source of information if you want to "go native". Natives are so much easier to grow, provide food and cover for birds and butterflies, and low maintenance to boot. Water rationing is becoming pretty common in Florida, and planting things that will deal with normal rainfall is a way to have a beautiful garden in spite of water restrictions.

Thanks so much for your replies. I hate to post pictures because they look so horrible. All of you northern growers seem to have such beautiful green trees in pots. Maybe I need to move up north and grow in pots too! I will try to get some posted though. The reason I use copper is because I probably have every fungus you can think of in my yard too. I have been gardening organically for about 4 years and have a lot of beneficial bugs in my yard. I guess the aphids are just more prolific than the beneficials. I live way out west of Fort Lauderdale about a 1.5 miles from the Everglades. The soil is muck soil with limestone about 1.5 feet down. Some parts where we brought in some fill around the house pad have a little sand too. Most things I plant seem to like the soil. I also have access to horse manure which I use a lot around my fruit trees. I heard citrus doesn't like that so much and that the roots need air, so I've stopped using it on the citrus. They get sun most of the day. A few of the key limes are shaded in the morning but then get sun from about 10:30 on. I have 4 key limes, 2 in the ground and 2 in pots. One grapefruit (the one I might loose), and two tangerines (look the best). I have other trees that need spraying too. Mangoes (2 types), bananas, grumichama, sugar apple, fig, passion fruit and lychee. Of all of these, citrus are giving me the hardest time. I do have a big problem with ants in my yard and love the tanglefoot idea. The nematodes sound great too and I have already done some research on them but can't find the one that is specifically for the diaprepes root weevil. I will continue my search. I just bought a new backpack sprayer because this spraying job is getting huge. Terri

Hmmmmm.... this is the Organic Lawn Care Forum.... This thread is titled "Moved to Florida, grass is a mess and I want ONLY organic" swflagrdnr said: "Only after a lawn is well established should you try only organic methods." Then went on to say: "start out with syntehtics and then later experiment with organic methods." Also said: "He is in Oklahoma, so his advice is not pertinent to our Florida discussion." That's just wrong. It's not true & is ill chosen advice. Since when does the state you reside in have anything to do with whether or not you choose organic practices? Since when is St Augustine grass unique only to Florida? Since when is the practice of organic gardening an experiment? Since when has plant nutrition changed exclusively for the state of Florida? St Augustine grass is grown in many other parts of the country other than Florida, including right here in Oklahoma as well as Texas and Louisiana to name a couple. Successful organic lawn programs are centered around the soil. It must be alive with wide variety of beneficial microorganisms and bugs. Beneficial microbes both feed and protect the plants from disease-causing microbes. All the organic gardener does is feed the beneficial microbes and let them do their work. Chemical fertilizers provide an "empty" type of food directly to the plants. This is like the empty calories we get from eating pure refined sugar. Microbes provide full service to the plants. They decompose dead plant and animal residues to humus; combine nitrogen and carbon to prevent nutrient loss; suppress disease; produce plant growth regulators; develop soil structure, tilth, and water penetration/retention; clean up chemical residues; shift soil pH toward neutral; retrieve nutrients from distant parts of the soil; decompose thatch; and control nitrogen supply to the plants according to need. The intensive use of inorganic nitrogen fertilizer may so overload a humus-depleted soil with nitrate as to cause it to leach into surface waters when nitrate levels may readily exceed public health standards. Leached nitrate also wastes expensive fertilizer synthesized from an increasingly diminished supply of natural gas. Apart from any other possible and yet to be established virtues, the use of organic fertilizer avoids these difficulties and holds the promise of restoring the natural source of soil fertility - humus. Lisa, in your original post you said: If someone could give me a brief step by step, just a "do this first, then this" I would greatly appreciate any suggestions :) I want to plant a "cottage garden" next but first things first. You should take a shovel and just dig into your lawn, dig it down 6 or 8 inches deep so you can get some kind of idea what kind of soil you're dealing with. If it's really really poor like swflagrdnr thinks it is, just made up of fill dirt, a calcerous, sand mix with shells and little to no organic matter, then you should consider topdressing with compost, but no where in your post do you indicate that this is new contruction & I'm thinking if this had been an established lawn, perhaps it just hasn't been looked after in a while and a bit of TLC would go a long ways. When you dig it up, if you see some bugs, worms, you know, living stuff, then that's great! Let's get your microherd some water and some food & as I posted earlier, we just treat it like it's the best lawn in the neighborhood, then one day later this year you'll look out the window and say "I've got one of the best lawns in the neighborhood!" Here's your list: 1) Identify your turfgrass. 2) Stop using chemical fertilizers 3) Begin using feed grains, right away. Then fertilize on a regular basis. 4) Depending on what's available you can use: CGM (applied @ 20lbs per 1000sqft for use as pre-M or 10lbs per 1000sqft for use as fertilizer), Soybean meal (applied at 15lbs per 1000sqft) Alfalfa pellets (applied at 20lbs per 1000sqft) 5) Follow the lawn care basics I outlined above. Good day, Dan