Atwood LawnCare

If you live on a lake or next to a river or stream, you are very conscious of using excess fertilizer that may cause algae problems in the water. The nutrient that causes the most concern is phosphorus. (If you look a fertilizer bag, P is the middle number xx-XX-xx) Customers want to have a green lawn, but do not want to be making their lake green too. Fortunately, Atwood offers a no-Phosphorus fertilizer that will help protect the lakes and streams. Customers can be assured that our standard fertilizer programs do not normally contain phosphorus fertilizer. (The reason we do not add it is that our soils typically do not need any additional P added.) So just being on a normal Atwood fertilization program is “lake-safe”.

On occasion, a customer may request organic fertilizer specifically because they are on a lake. You should know that that may actually be more damaging than a standard fertilizer product. Organic fertilizers almost always contain high amounts of P simply because they are organic. [Typical organic fertilizer has something like a 21-3-7 analysis and a standard professional fertilizer is a 30-0-10.] Be reassured that all fertilizers are, in-fact, non-toxic and will not cause any problems for children or pets. But if lake safe is your primary concern, we recommend a standard fertilizer that has no-P, and not organics.

Even if you do not live on a lake or river, everyone should be concerned about water quality. Anything that gets into the storm drain in front of a home will eventually go directly into Lake St. Clair or Lake Erie (depending on where they live). So in actuality, every home is a lake-front property. Its just that not everyone has to pay the lake-front taxes! That is why Atwood blows the fertilizer pellets off the driveway and street after granular applications. We don’t want any fertilizer going into our rivers and lakes anymore than anyone else.