Tiemco wrote: "I don't even consider it for use in a yard unless you just want green coverage, and don't care about color or texture. Most of the yards in my neighborhood are about 4,100 square feet, but there are some yards that are half an acre. Half an acre is a lot of turf to cover. I would guess some folks might want to seed inexpensive K-31 on much of that half acre, but leave 5,000 to 10,000 square feet close to the house for the higher quality fescues, whether tall or fine. Of course, you and I both mean "Pennington" when we said "Pendleton." Pennington also sells uncoated K-31. Would I plant K-31 in my small 4,100 square-foot yard? No. But I was happy to see a big box carry grass seed that wasn't either from Scotts or Pennington. The more competition, the better for the consumer. Walmart is selling all those bags of K-31 to somebody. And every year I see K-31 in other big box stores too. So I guess those bags are going to buyers in more rural areas with large pastures, and maybe to suburban buyers with half an acre or even a full acre to care for.

Answering my own question... after a couple of (dozen) phone calls... Summer Winds Nursery at 67th and Bell carries 5 pound containers. Nothing for larger quantities. Any ideas?

Find a seed and feed store and buy the finely cracked corn sold as 'chicken scratch' -- much cheaper than the 'horticultural corn meal.'

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.