Our lawns and gardens are craving something natural to help them thrive, the way nature intended. Fish emulsion has been a prime organic fertilizer used by our ancestors for centuries. I’m uncertain as to how anyone ever thought that synthetic fertilizers would benefit our environment, but someone did. Hands down, though, organic fertilizer out shines chemical fertilizers every time.

The best fish by-product to use for an organic fertilizer comes from the Menhaden fish. Menhaden meaning “that which manures”. Such a great name since manure is an excellent fertilizer too. The Menhaden fish is an organic and renewable source, serving North America for centuries as an extraordinary organic fertilizer. For centuries our ancestors used the Menhaden fish to make crops grow incredible yields?way before synthetic fertilizer was a twinkle in anyone’s eye.

A much desired quality of fish emulsion as organic fertilizer is that it offers instant gratification. One misconception many people have is that all organic fertilizers don’t act fast enough. True, some organic fertilizers are slow acting but not fish emulsion. Your plants benefit almost immediately after its application. Some other organic fertilizers leave you waiting. Often their ingredients need some time to decompose and release their nutrients. You have to be careful to store fish emulsion at room temperature so that it doesn’t degrade before you want it to as it will in excessive heat.

What fish and parts of the fish are used for making fish fertilizer? By-products or waste materials from various types of fish are used. And although technically several varieties of fish can be used, mostly Menhaden fish that contain few amounts of meat and used for making animal feed are used.

The first step is to cook the fish and to squeeze its juice and oils by pressing. The oil is removed while the leftover solids can be ground and baked into protein meals and fed to animals. The juice of the fish is brought to a boil until it becomes more concentrated and results in a fish emulsion.

A small amount of phosphoric acid is added to the fish emulsion to lower the pH. Lowering the pH makes the liquid fertilizer more acidic, which prevents it from decaying and fermenting into gas. Before phosphoric acid was added in the manufacturing process, containers of fish emulsion were known to burst from fermentation. Because the amount of added phosphoric acid is so small (less than one percent by weight), the product is still considered organic.