Scratch it in & water well - that might disperse it enough.... We have a 'healthy' rat pop. here as well - I just keep refilling the bait stations outside & keep 'em out of/away from the house & try not to think about the rest of it too much = S @ least our rats (Asian Roof rats) aren't much interested in grains - they prefer fruits & meats. HTH

Thanks for the reply. Sorry for not including more info. I believe I have a perennial rye/fescue mix -- it is in a rather shaded area that remains damp most of the time. I overseeded with a "sun/shade" mix this spring and have mowed three times so far on the highest height with a reel mower (I think it is 3"; I don't have the manual on hand to check). I find it really difficult to not lower the mower, though, since the grass just seems to bend over so easily when it is that tall, and I have long tufts I have to redo over and over again. In the spring, average rainfall starting in Feb and March is 4.5 - 5 inches per month. April and May dry up a bit (usually ~3 inches per month) but because of my shaded area (and clay soil), it really never gets really "dry" here in the spring. Especially considering November and December usually bring in over 6 inches of rain each, leaving the ground pretty wet by the time April rolls around. I just posted in the lawn forum about my "crabgrass" (asking if that is indeed what I have; I've now started to wonder). In any case, I would still like to try CGM in the spring if it might work with our damp conditions. Thanks again. I appreciate the time you spend to help newbies like me (:

kathyga........I've written about it a few times here. Basically, the grass - and a couple weeds - in the corn gluten meal containers grew like crazy, telling me that it is an awesome fertilizer and not so great preemergent. I didn't get any crabgrass in that container, but I recall getting a really weird weed that I had never seen before and have never seen since. The most striking thing was the difference between the corn gluten meal and non corn gluten meal containers. When I dumped out the corn gluten meal container, the roots were REALLY deep and thick, causing the whole thing to come out in one giant clump, which was pretty interesting since I didn't spread too many seeds in there originally. The one with no fertilizer was pretty sparse in terms of root action.

If you read that message to the end, I was clearly under the belief that Milorganite had zero metals in it. When I say zero, I meant relatively low to the same levels that ordinary cattle manure compost would have "zero" metals. What changed my mind was the Washington State report that we have been talking about here. Prior to reading that report I had been listening to the "incinerated sewage sludge salesmen" about their product. Deerslayer is correct in correcting part of what I said. The list from Washington State only includes the 1,700 or so fertilizers that passed their testing and are allowed to be sold in the state. I learned that in this discussion. If I make that same error in the future, please refer me back to this thread. The Washington report did not cover the 1,300 others that did not pass. Milorganite is apparently superior to nearly half of the products when you consider its ranking among the 4,000. As for the three items on your short list remaining, I have finally found the information you might have provided earlier regarding the heating process of the Milorganite product. On their home page there is a link to how the product is made. I thought at first it was a link to the graphic, but it is a link to a video. In that video they explain that the products is not burned to ash but only heated to the point of killing the pathogens. If I had had that info last week (and here I am believing the salesman again), we could have put this to rest. 1. Milorganite is incinerated. When something goes through an incinerator that material is commonly referred to as having been incinerated. EPA requires an incinerator and Milorganite uses one. Since nobody had any information about the heating process more than the use of an incinerator, I was of the belief that the resulting product was the ash of the microbes, not a dried microbe. In the four years since I wrote that other comment, nobody has come forth with the information you presented regarding the low heat. Although for some reason there does seem to be a faint memory of the heating process, but I can't remember where or when. I write a lot late at night. 2. The process for making Milorganite "is more like the process of firing clay to make china than any other process I (DCHall) can think of.". As far as I knew it was. Now I know, or think I know, differently. As you pointed out it is more like cooking chicken. Actually after looking at the video, it is more like drying clothes. 3. You implied that Milorganite doesn't contain any protein I said that because that was my belief - just as you apparently believed that all the products on the Washington State list were there because they met the EPA exceptional quality standard. We generally write the things we believe. This protein revelation finally explains to me how Milorganite works. What would you think of the effectiveness of a fertilizer that you believed to consist of ash? Regarding the grains, apparently you have missed my explanation of that the previous two times. I have never seen the products. The report named the name on the bag. I tend to believe what I read from the manufacturer unless I have other information. As a matter of fact, grain from one field, or from one stalk, will have different nutritional values than the next one. The differences in the products listed on the report are striking but I'm not going to second guess them at this point. I believe there are other websites where you can view bag advertising versus test results. Since we were really discussing metals I didn't think the pursuit of a grain discussion was really relevant. I did think I remembered seeing several corn gluten meal products in that list, but it must have been a different list. The point was the Washington report covers a very wide range of fertilizer products from the organic (maybe) to the waste materials. There are other reports around that Washington site that discuss the use of metal waste material in fertilizers.