‘Dressing’ for the garden keeps plants healthy, strong

My great-grandfather’s porch extended across the length of his Victorian farmhouse and from his wooden chair positioned there, he could watch the traffic pass between his home and the dairy barn and garden across the way. The man’s towering stature and thoughtful, methodical pace caused one to watch and wonder in anticipation that something very wise might, at any moment, fall from his lips. Although I don’t remember him saying much, I do recall him saying one thing to my father: “Got to get some dressing on the garden.”

As their conversation continued, I remember thinking, at a very tender age of 4 or 5, what exactly that meant. Dressing? Was he going to take a jar of oil and vinegar out there and sprinkle it on the plants? Why would a grown man do something so ridiculous?

It didn’t seem to make much sense to me, but he seemed to know what he was doing. He had an incredible green thumb, and as I admired the “prickly cukes” vining up the strings that were carefully laced between the roof and floor of his porch, it was the first time I realized how seriously he took growing things.

It still makes me smile when I hear gardeners say they need to put some “dressing” on the garden. Somehow, the ill-fragranced manure from the stalls of cows, sheep, pigs, horses and chickens undergoes a transfiguration to the miraculously rich and much-wanted dressing, from which our salad of garden plants lushly spring forth.

Dressing, of course, is fertilizer produced by livestock. Fertilizer is, simply put, plant food. Just as our human bodies need vitamins and minerals, plants need various nutrients in order to grow properly. Think for a moment about fertilizer. In the deepest literal sense, fertilizer makes the soil of the earth itself fertile for plant growth. We’re not just feeding plants the nutrients they need when we apply fertilizer, really, we’re making the ground rich and productive.

What kind of dressing do you have on your garden? Do you use synthetic fertilizer from a bag or plastic container? Or do you use plant- or animal-based dressing?

Fertilizer is typically rated in terms of its nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium content. Plants require these three nutrients in the largest quantity. They are called macronutrients. There are a number of other nutrients plants need in lesser amounts, called micronutrients. If you’re using synthetic fertilizer on your garden, it most likely contains the three macronutrients, is fabricated from various sources which are put into soluble forms that plants can easily use. Your bag of fertilizer might read “20-20-20” or “10-5-10” indicating the proportion of nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium (N-P-K) within.

But what about the kind of fertilizer my great-grandfather used? His came from barnyard animals and from the composting pile that seemed to grow skyward from the ramp built off one side of his barn. It wasn’t clearly rated in N-P-K terms, but it was a time-tested effective use of animal waste. He recycled in his garden the nutrients produced by his livestock, and, in time, those nutrients yielded food energy for his family.

When I was a child, the thought of “dressing” confused me. As an adult, I have a great appreciation for the cyclic conversion of nutrients from plants to animals to plants. It’s a cycle that doesn’t, and shouldn’t, stop. Sadly, one thing that threatens the stoppage of the cycle is the decline of livestock farming. Fewer farms means fewer opportunities for gardeners to obtain local livestock manure for fertilizer.

Perhaps our fast-paced lives do not offer much opportunity to acknowledge that without those lazily grazing cows in the pasture down the road, our opportunities to obtain wholesome nutrients for our garden dwindle and dwindle. So, do try to remember, as you toil in your patch this season, that four-legged farm creatures are our friends – useful, in fact, essential to a sustainable, working landscape on all scales. Perhaps we all should endeavor to appreciate the livelihood of those who cultivate the animals that produce rich nutrients that enliven the bit of earth we garden.

Diana George Chapin is the NEWS garden columnist. Send horticulture questions to Gardening Questions, 512 North Ridge Road, Montville 04941 or e-mail dianagc@midcoast.com. Selected questions will be answered in future columns. Include name, address and telephone number.