By Kirsten Buys
C & G Staff Writer

Gardeners are turning to organic fertilizers, composting and other natural gardening methods in an effort to keep themselves and the earth healthy.

“I think people are starting to jump on that bandwagon,” said Chris McDonald, manager at Ray Wiegand’s Nursery and Garden Center.

McDonald said organic fertilizers have really gone up in sales, and the center, 47747 Romeo Plank Road in Macomb Township, again is selling such beneficial insects as praying mantises, lady bugs and nemotodes, which eat harmful insects. It used to stock the insects, now available for about $9.99 a tub, but interest for them dropped off until recently.

“I think, to a point, we were ahead of our time,” he said. “That’s something we used to sell years ago, and now with (Home and Garden Television) and everything, they’re back.”

Peter Pone, owner of Evergreen Home and Garden Center, with locations in Eastpointe and Clinton Township, said while organic items have been around for a long time, prices are finally coming down.

“There’s a lot of people that always have intentions of using organics, but when they found out how much it costs, they shy away from it,” Pone said. “Now the prices have come down quite a bit, and there’s a lot more companies offering organics.”

In addition to organic fertilizers, Janie Saltarelli at Auburn Oaks Garden Center, 3820 W. Auburn Road in Rochester Hills, said customers are buying up insecticide soaps.

“Some of the chemicals you spray last for a week or longer,” Saltarelli said. “Whereas insecticide soaps work on contact and you have a lot less chance of hurting the good insects.”

Due to gardening TV shows and a general societal push toward protecting the environment, the family-owned center, which opened in 1964, no longer has to post that it will reuse any plastic pots brought back from customers.

At Saxton’s Landscaping in Farmington Hills, customers often bring back the plastic flats from their flower purchases, said General Manager Sara Kwiatkowski. Because suppliers use sanitized flats, the staff at Saxton’s, 22820 Albion Ave., finds other uses for them, like using them to line their trunks when they make deliveries instead of buying plastic to lay down.

“They bring back their empty flats and are super excited — I’m trying to reduce my footprint,” Kwiatkowski said. “People do not want to throw stuff away. They do not want to be wasteful. They’re driving all the way back to the shop just because they want us to reuse it, and we do our best to do that.”

Homeowners and gardeners are even finding a way to reuse their trash, by composting it, which turns it into useful fertilizer. After McDonald’s wife saw a worm compost machine on “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” Weigand’s began stocking them.

The plastic composters, which sell for about $160, can compost 5 to 8 pounds of paper and vegetable matter each day when the worms get up to full capacity. Worm castings, which are odorless, then can be used to fertilize indoor and outdoor plants. McDonald said his family keeps theirs in the basement. The center sells worm castings also, if gardeners don’t want to do their own composting.

“Once you get the worms going, there’s no cost,” McDonald said. “As long as you continue to feed the worms and keep the cycle going, they reproduce and everything in there. Based on your daily household waste, they will kind of expand to keep up with you.”

Other gardeners, usually those with bigger lots, work their own compost piles without the help of a composter. Anyone wishing to start and operate a compost pile can find pointers on the Southeastern Oakland County Resource Recovery Authority (SOCRRA) Web site, www.socrra.org, or can contribute their waste to an areawide compost pile at 1741 School Road in Rochester Hills.

One thing every lawn and garden needs to survive is water, and Evergreen and Wiegand’s are among the garden centers that sell special rain collection barrels. The tubs, which cost about $150, have a way of collecting rainwater yet closing it off so it doesn’t become a breeding ground for mosquitoes. There’s a spigot to get the water when gardeners are ready to use it.

When all is said and done, Saltarelli said the green movement aids the environment, homeowners and gardeners, and the garden centers.

“I think it helps our industry a lot,” she said. “Even when it comes to selling trees. When you plant a tree, it can help keep your house cooler in the summertime. It helps with utility bills. Evergreens help with windbreaks to keep the wind from hitting your house. It helps us all stay green.”

You can reach Staff Writer Kirsten Buys at kbuys@candgnews.com or at (586) 498-1030.