Question
Thank you so much. I am wondering if you know of an organic concoction that can be used as a "weed & feed" Or if the lava sand, sugar and agricultural cornmeal would work and how often I should do it. Please just let me know at your convenience. There is no rush because I live in Central Ohio and my yard is currently covered with about a foot of snow. Don't kill yourself staying up late to answer my question. But thank you again so much you've been a great help already. Toni
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The text above is a follow-up to ...

-----Question-----
We have a really big bare patch in our backyard and then smaller ones started appearing everywhere. I would rathewr not use chemicals because I have a 2 year old who will be playing in the yard. Our condo association is telling me we need to fix it but we have no clue how to fix it. What would you suggest doing. (the big patch, always fills with water and floods and just in case you need to know, our soil is like clay except for the top couple of inches.)
 Thank you so much, hope you can help.  Toni
-----Answer-----
Hi Tony;
Clay is one of the hardest things to try to do anything with.
It won't let water seep through to get to plant roots, and it just has to be reconditioned and made into good soil before you can successfully grow anything there.
For low areas, fill in.
If you want to really fix it in one year, till it all up, but till in a lot of bark mulchh to loosen up that clay, while the organics you use condition it into lovely topsoil.
Those bare patches could be due to fungus, so when you till, also till in Agricultural corn meal.
To make lovely soil, right away, do this.
Put about 3 or 4 inches of bark mulch all over, and over this apply about 10 pounds Agricultural corn meal per 1000 sq.ft. of yard,
Lava sand, You just broadcast some of this all over, by hand, till you put a light covering.
If you put more, it will only bnefit more.
Using the organics, NOTHING burns your grass if you use too mauc, and you don't have to get it in every inch. the benefits will travel.
Put sugar ( plain table sugar) at the rate of 4 or 5 pounds per 1000, sq.ft.
Till all that in to a depth of about 6 inches, and you will have 8 inches of quality top soil.
   I use cedar bark mulch because it takes 2 years to compost, so it keeps the soil looser longer to give the other organics you will use, more time to do their work.
Cerdar also has insect repelling qualities. Termites WILL NOT go where it it.
I put cedar bark mulch all over my yard when it is time for termites to swarm, and for fleas and tick to come out. I put a trail of cedar bark mulch about 3 or 4 inches wide and an inch or two deep, all around the foundation of the house, any outbuildings etc. We have lived here 42 years, and never had a termite. Our neighbors do. North Texas is a good climate for termites.
If any weeds come up, they should start to die out soon.
Weeds love poor soil and will not thrive in rich soil. When you get rich soil, any that come up will not survine long. Ususlly by a couple of mowings, they are gone.
Plant your grass or put down sod, and you will have a nice lawn this summer.
The sugar does NOT kill weeds or anything else. All it does is nourish the beneficial microbes that work round the clock enriching your soil.
Chemical fertilizers and other chemicals you use, kill them, as well as all the other beneficial insects and critters that you WANT in your soil and in your yard.
Toads love slugs, as well as other insects. Lizards keep all the aphids off my roses, as well as other insects they eat, and grass snakes eat harmful insects.
I never see my grass snakes, which is the way I want it.
I will protect them,and appreciate what they do for me, but I don't want to socialize with them.
The best thing about organics, after the facts that it conditions the worst soil and makes it ood, weeds won;t thrive in it, so you don't kill yourself weeding, you work a lot less in your yard and have so much better results, and spend a lot less money, is,,,,,
You don't have to keep children or pets off the yard for awhile after you put chemicals on it.
You don't have to worry if a child or animal puts a blade of grass in their mouth ( which they do).
The pets and children can be out there with you while youy are putting down these organic products and remedies, the children can even helYou don't have to worry about your skin coming into contact with them. They just won't harm anything, and the children can dig their lkittle hands in a help throw the stuff around. It doesn't all have to be put down so evenly to prevent burning the grass.
Organics is the only way to go, as far as I am concerned. I am just sorry it took me so many years to get wise.
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If you don't want to till it up, just fill in the low places, with soil you have mixed bark mulch in, throw the lava sand, sugar, and Agricultural corn meal all over the yard and water it well.
You can plug in where there are bare spoots, and as you get other low spots, do the same things.
In a few years, just treating topically with organic products will work through the soil and emend it.
If you want to know about other organic things to use, just write me, and I will also tell you how to use herbs, that you can easily grow, to keep insects out of your house, so you don't have to use insecticides in there either.

PS;
I hope there are no typos. This is so long, and I have so many questions to answer, I am not proofreading tonight.LOL
C

Answer
Hi Toni;
Well, Howard Garrett says Gluten Corn Meal.
It is the protein fraction of corn,and he recommends it as a weed and feed.
I have not tried it.
The sugar got rid of the weeds by reving up those beneficial microbes.
Now, my soil was not all that depleted when I started with the sugar.
I had been leaving the grass clippings to feed back into the soil for years, and it helped keep the soil in pretty good condition, in spite of the chemicals I had been putting on it.
It certainly wouldn't hurt to put some of that down too, about 15 pounds per 1000 sq.ft.
It would only enhance the benefits of the sugar, and the sugar is cheap enough to go ahead and use it too.
I would go ahead and put the sugar and Corn Gluten Meal down as soon as the snow melts to where it is just adding water to the soil.
You just wouldn't have to water as much to get it started into the soil.
With the organics, it doesn't make much diference when you use them.
Unlike the chemicals, that you have to put dwn at particular times, they don't wear out, so no matter what time of year, they are going to start working on the soil.
Putting Agricultural Corn Meal down before the grass starts to green up, just stops the fungus before it starts to damage the grass, but the other things, just work to emend the soil, and they work as well one tinme as another.
Howard Garrett is a long experienced organic Agriculturist,and has been conducting these test gardens, and research for 40 years that I know of. He was writing an organic column for the Dallas Morning News when we first moved here in 66.
He has doneprojects for large corporations, new urban areas, etc for a long time, but I personally think he does a lot that benefits a lot, but you CAN get along without them.
In the 10 years I have been on an organic program, all I have put on my lawn was sugar, and when a fungus showed it's ugly head, I used baking soda on it.
I sprayed the rose bushes and shrubs that were susceptable to white powdery mildew etc, with the first sign of growth in the spring.
I KNEW the black spot and powdery mildew would try to get started, but I didn't spray the whole yard, unless it looked like Brown Patch or some other fungus was trying to get started.
When you put down the chemical fertilizers, they start right away to wear out and wash through the soil with rain and/or waterings, but the organics stay there and just work on improving the soil.
When our Temps get past the 100 mark in the summer, and stays there for several days, and the heat is really parching everything, I will apply sugar again.
My grass started to look a little stressed after about 6 days of temps over 100, so I applied sugar again and water it in.
The grass perked right up again, so from that, I assume the extreme heat we get here in the summers, kils out some of the beneficial microbes, or at least depletes their energies some, like it does mine. LOl
Howard Garrett recomends fertilizing with an organic fertilizer about 3 times a year, early spring, about mid summer ( june or o), and again in the fall.
I bought a bag of organic fertilizer a few years ago, but everything looked great, and I haven't used it yet. LOL
I did use the alfalfa meal and lava sand last year.
I was impressed, especially with the alfalfa meal.
My rose bushes got new growth, and the new leaves were almost twice the size of the others.
Blooms were a deeper color too.
The alfalfa meal I broadcast by hand, about the same thickness as I did the sugar. Just a light application all over.
It weigs less than the sugar, and there is no weight on the bag, but my husband said he thought the bag weighed about 20 pounds.
I used it tice all over the front yard, and back, about 3 or 4 thousand feet, and put it in every new potted plant, and made alfalfa tea a few times.
I still have about 1/4th of a bag left. It doesn't take much.
I make alfalfa tea to water my container plants and house plants, about every 2 months or so.
To make the tea, you put 1 cup alfalfa meal in a 5 gallon container of water, and let it set overnight.
Stir it well and use that to water the plants. I put about 1 cup of tea to a container about 17 inches across, less for smaller containers. I guess I aded about 1/4th cup to a quart of water for the house plants.
It makes a great foliar feed too.
Strain it so it won't clog up the sprayer, and just spray it on shrubs etc. You can use it that way for the whole yard, but that just seems time consuming to me, since you can just put the alfalfa meal down and water it in. And mixing up so many 5 gallons to cover a whole yard, would be quite a job. LOL
The dregs from the tea, you can just dump on the garden or in the containers.
I belong to his web site.
You might like to join too.
I pay a yearly subscription fee of ( I think it is) $2.00, and that gives me access to his entire site, and a monthlky online newsletter, and a monthly magazine that yiou can access online and you also get it in the snail mail.
He has a pretty good library of videos that you can view as a member.
I spend hours sometimes, just watching the videos on his site. I am learning a lot of them.
there are also member forums where you can post querstions, or results of what you are doing and getting results.
When you subscribe, you become a member of his " ground crew".
The address is   www.dirtdoctor.com

He is Texas' organic guru. LOL
He directs most of his columns and videos to Texas grdeners, but the same things work equaly well for anywhere in the country, or the world for that matter.
Tke a look at his website, and join if you like.
It is realy worth the subscription fee.
Charlotte