It's nearly the end of summer term, which means nothing else but getting really excited about the long summer holiday! And so that life is not boring, I decided to stench up the neighbourhood with some good, honest, organic, all-natural, wonderful, brilliant and stinking-like-cow-dung organic nettle brew/fertiliser. We do it every year when the nettles become abundant, leaving some of the plants for insects but making sure we benefit from them, too.
I originally got the idea from an episode of "Edible Garden" by Alys Fowler that I saw on YouTube.
It really is simple. Cut up some nettles, pour water over them and let rot for a couple of weeks. It is suggested that you cover it as the mixture can smell quite badly, however once it is done, the smell will mostly go away and the liquid should be almost see through. Diluted with water 1:10 it will be nitrogen, potassium, copper, zinc, magnesium and calcium-full feed to kick your plants into growth.
Less is more here, I think, so I tend to add a small cup of the feed into every watering can I pour over my plants to feed them small amounts of minerals gradually, as large concentrations of these minerals might cause water to move out of the roots by osmosis and eventually kill the entire plant.
Happy stinking!
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- Simple tutorial for making nettle fertiliser
- More detailed article about the nutrients that this fertiliser contains and which plants will and will not enjoy it
I've always liked the idea of making my own fertiliser but I've never actually done it. There aren't any nettles growing here, anyway, but I suspect a similar result could be achieved with comfrey.
ReplyDeleteI think so. Back at home I remember reading about people doing a very similar thing with chicken and rabbit poo. I couldn't find any reference to it now that I tried though :s Do you compost your chickens' poo? I heard that is awesome.
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