Is Milorganite Safe?

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Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by tlh222 » July 30th, 2010, 1:43 pm

I have read nothing but good things here about Milorganite, so I was a bit taken back by a comment that a Lesco dealer just made to me. I was there for other reasons, but the Milorganite topic came up and he told me to "be very careful" how much I apply. He went on about all the "heavy metals" that leech into the product from the pipes in Milwaukee. He really made me feel a bit uneasy out using it even at all with three kids around. Went on to say to be careful handling it.

He also did give me the impression that he does not cary it, but did offer "two similar products without the heavy metals". Have to admit, I am a bit skeptical having read everything on here. Can anyone ease my nerves a bit about this guys toughts? Do any of his comments have merit?

Thanks.

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by MorpheusPA » July 30th, 2010, 1:57 pm

Essentially, no merit.

We previously calculated that if you remove the top six inches of your soil and replace it with Milorganite, you're still below the EPA limits on every single heavy metal. At reasonable usage, far less than replacing the top six inches, it's simply not a problem.

Handling...well, I would wash your hands, but that's because there might theoretically be a few harmful bacteria left. Maybe. I do to remove the smell, but other than that, I don't concern myself with it.

Does it contain heavy metals? Yes. So does every other fertilizer on the market. It meets the EPA's limitations for a Class A fertilizer (not by a great deal, but it does). You contain heavy metals.

One thing to consider is the form of the metals. I'm unimpressed by Ironite as it can exceed EPA limits on arsenic, and that arsenic is available and leaches into groundwater. Any lead in the Milorganite is organically bound, plus lead soil binds easily. By the same token, sodium is explosive and chlorine is extremely poisonous--but you don't think twice when you put salt on your food. The chemistry matters, and when bound together they're not only harmless, you require them.

The one case where I wouldn't use it is where I had a known lead issue. In that case, I'd use the most lead-limited fertilizer possible to avoid adding any more (plus I'd be working on removing it as much as possible).

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by schreibdave » July 30th, 2010, 2:50 pm

I always wondered where those heavy metals in milorganite actually came from. Is it true that they are from lead pipes? I assumed that they were from run-off from the roads.

I cant comment on the science, but milorganite is my primary fertilizer. If my kids get lead poisoning it will likely be from the lead paint that both sets of grandparents have flaking off their walls.

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by kickflip » July 30th, 2010, 3:54 pm

You may want to google the term biosolids to see what other people say.

I found that there were mainly extreme opinions with the most positive probably coming from some sort of biosolids lobbying group and the negative from activists/consumer watch dog groups. I felt uneasy after reading some of the negative stuff so I decided to only use organics (soy, alfalfa, corn).

One other complaint (besides heavy metals) was the fact that there may be other harmful stuff in sewage sludge that the EPA doesn't test for (I believe an article by Cornell discussed this). Also, if it matters, I don't think the USDA organic program allows biosolids for fertilizer.

I'm not trying to start an argument. You may want to do some more research to make your own decision. But...I'm sure there's a lot more things that are worse to your health than dumping Milorganite on your lawn.
Last edited by kickflip on July 30th, 2010, 4:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by andy10917 » July 30th, 2010, 4:05 pm

sodium is explosive and chlorine is extremely poisonous--but you don't think twice when you put salt on your food.
I've used that a thousand times, but forgot it last Sunday when I was speaking with a group considering a small organic co-op. One of the folks started ranting that they couldn't use water from an adjacent lake because the water in a lake miles upstream had been treated with Copper Sulfate two years ago. I asked why that was a concern. He stated (somewhat angrily) that as a "manufactured herbicide that was a "sulfate of copper"" that the water was poisoned forever.

I tried explaining to him that Copper Sulfate occurs naturally. I tried explaining the differences between algicides and herbicides. He wasn't convinced. I showed him the OMRI certificate for Copper Sulfate products online. He wandered away and told someone else that I didn't get it. To him, we were discussing Agent Orange.


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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by southerncalpal » July 30th, 2010, 4:35 pm

I bet he drove away in his gasoline-powered earth-killer too...

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by MorpheusPA » July 30th, 2010, 9:17 pm

I tried explaining to him that Copper Sulfate occurs naturally. I tried explaining the differences between algicides and herbicides. He wasn't convinced. I showed him the OMRI certificate for Copper Sulfate products online. He wandered away and told someone else that I didn't get it. To him, we were discussing Agent Orange.
Sigh. It a great fungicide too, as evidenced by Bordeaux mix. Plus my daily multivitamin contains 0.9 mg of copper, probably in sulfate form. I require it to keep from having a nice bout of anemia and neurological degeneration. Which wouldn't precisely be fun; I was anemic once in the past when my gallbladder torched itself and died.

Many of the "scary" "heavy" metals (and I use the scare quotes quite intentionally) aren't that scary. Bound into workable molecules, they're either required in small amounts by you (and your lawn and gardens), or harmless and able to be excreted very easily. Almost any organically bound molecule, including lead, is harmless to you and will simply pass through.

Warranted, the reason I don't like Ironite is because the EPA doesn't--only half the arsenic is bound safely, the other half is free to roam. But Milorganite? I have no issues with that.

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by Dchall_San_Antonio » July 30th, 2010, 11:13 pm

I don't use Milorganite because it is so easy to find other organic fertilizers with essentially no heavy metals when compared to Milorganite. Here are the heavy metals in alfalfa, Milorganite, and Ironite. Data is expressed in parts per million.
LEVELS OF NONNUTRITIVE SUBSTANCES IN FERTILIZERS
REPORT TO THE LEGISLATURE
December 1999
PREPARED BY:
WASHINGTON STATE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE
WASHINGTON STATE DEPARTMENT OF ECOLOGY

NATURAL ROSE FERTILIZER ALFALFA MEAL 1-1-8
MILORGANITE 6-2-0 FERTILIZER
IRONITE 1-0-0

Arsenic 0.05
Arsenic 7.2
Arsenic 4380

Cadmium 0
Cadmium 3.1
Cadmium 48.6

Cobalt 0
Cobalt 4
Cobalt 11

Mercury 0.02
Mercury 2.7
Mercury 15.1

Molybdenum 1.74
Molybdenum 15
Molybdenum 13

Nickel 0.01
Nickel 40
Nickel 11

Lead 0.03
Lead 120
Lead 2910

Selenium 0.46
Selenium 5.8
Selenium 4.6

Zinc 117.7
Zinc 760
Zinc 9940

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by GaryCinChicago » July 30th, 2010, 11:30 pm

If you're scared - get a dog!

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by andy10917 » July 31st, 2010, 1:13 pm

What is wrong with those concentrations of Nickel, Selenium, Zinc and Molybdenum? Why are they painted with the same brush as Arsenic and Lead? What forms are the Lead and Arsenic in?

Are you asserting that everything that has an Atomic Number over 23 (Sodium) is automatically bad, in any concentration?

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by Dchall_San_Antonio » August 2nd, 2010, 9:57 am

Are you complaining to me or are you complaining to the report?

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by andy10917 » August 2nd, 2010, 10:21 am

The report. I'm trying to make it clear to folks that the powers-that-be often measure things that have no application in the real world. Their very presence on reports scares people that do not have the background to determine their meaning. Then a few municipalities ban things that are on "lists", and it's game-over for other municipalities to fight the it-must-be-true bans that were based on meaningless factoids.

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by clay&crabgrass » August 2nd, 2010, 10:25 am

IRONITE®
Mineral Supplement 1-0-1
Contains iron and nine other minerals(including Arsenic, Mercury, Lead) essential to lawn health.

anybody here worried about giant mutant worms? yikes!

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by andy10917 » August 2nd, 2010, 10:58 am

Nice sound bite. Great headline. Everyone says "give me the Cliff Notes version" these days. I doubt the a single member actually read the real report and found lines like:
Another variation in the metals data occurs with products that contain one or more of the metals cobalt, molybdenum or zinc. These three metals are essential for plant growth. When a particular metal such as Zinc is used as a plant nutrient, the levels of that metal are allowed to exceed the Washington metals standards. Thus, high levels of zinc in certain products listed in Appendices A and B are not cause for concern.

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by Dchall_San_Antonio » August 2nd, 2010, 11:13 am

In reading the report it sounds like the metals they are to test for were legislated by the state. Thus the people who knew more about it, the ones doing the testing and writing the report, added the disclaimer.

Maybe there is a league of people in Washington who are anti cobalt, molybdenum, zinc, nickel, and selenium??

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by andy10917 » August 2nd, 2010, 1:14 pm

Right!

The problem is that once somebody sees that list without seeing the context it was presented in, the "great shame" of being a "heavy metal" descends upon the product. There are many definitions of "heavy metals" and one is "everything with an Atomic Number over 23 (Sodium)". That makes Iron (Fe) a heavy metal, too.

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by MorpheusPA » August 2nd, 2010, 1:25 pm

Iron *is* a heavy metal, and pretty toxic to children. You too, in larger amounts. But children's vitamins don't contain iron for that reason--they absorb it too easily.

Of course, definitions matter. To an astrophysicist, anything above helium is a heavy element as it wasn't generated in the fusion event after the Big Bang (OK, a teeny bit of lithium got synthesized, too, but not much). Iron's the last element that can be fused in a star; attempts to fuse iron cause a rather spectacular supernova (which then has the energy excess to fuse the elements above iron and right into the transuranics).

I know a fellow (Pennsylvania Dutch, who do have the tendency due to founder effect) who over-synthesizes hemoglobin. Every few weeks he has to go have blood drawn or the iron levels will go toxic.

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by andy10917 » August 2nd, 2010, 1:57 pm

I know a person with the condition, too.

My point is that using the term "heavy metal" without context is wrong. But the vast majority of people will run away in fear when the term is used, and then eat (and feed their kids) foods laced with more synthesized pesticides than they could believe.

I'm not trying to push "let's pour mercury and lead all over the lawn". But I am pushing the idea that dropping scare-terms that you don't even know what they mean is wrong. Circles of unknowledgable people quoting each other as authorities and making lists of things that we ban because it is politically expedient to do so is unconscionable.

PS: I'm playing some devil's advocate, too - to make my point. I pay considerably extra for organic foods because I believe that the food-factory attitude of agriculture in this country leaves foods devoid of real nutrients.

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by John_in_SC » August 2nd, 2010, 2:08 pm

I was really hoping there would be *More* minerals/metals listed in that report.....

I have been looking for a list of what Milorganite can supply for Minor Elements.... as a way to supplement my yard.... Since Milorganite comes from People -- everything we eat will be in there... Simple fact -- we constantly Excrete just like we constantly Absorb.... My guess is that it isn't consistent, so they can't "Label" it on 1 particular Assay done in 1941.... so they don't even mention it...

I personally love the listing in their FAQ -- What if my dog eats Milorganite?
Their answer... Nothing unless he eats too much... then he will probably throw up because he can't digest it....

Thanks

John

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Re: Is Milorganite Safe?

Post by Dchall_San_Antonio » August 2nd, 2010, 3:16 pm

Milorganite comes from people but it also comes from laundry and cleaning solutions, degreasers, garden chemicals, industrial waste (even though they are probably required to have their own chemical disposal systems), food processors, meat packers, and anything that is dumped in the drain.

In San Antonio they test the incoming sewage continuously for signs of contamination. If they find something bad, they continue testing back upstream until the find the culprit. Then they fine his butt to the tune of $1,000 per day retroactive to the day they find the contaminant. But what's done is done by then. The $1,000 per day cannot undo the contamination that has already entered the stream. I strongly suspect Milwaukee has something similar in place to protect their sewage from damage.

What I find interesting is that the Coca Cola bottling plant is not allowed to dump their expired product because it has too much sugar. Local dairies are not allowed to dump the cream left over from making skim milk. Sugar and cream are considered contaminants because they mess with the anaerobic bacteria which preprocess the sewage before final processing. So rather than pay a $30,000 per month fine for dumping, they choose to pay $15,000 per month to the local compost guy to dump tens of thousands of gallons of sugar and cream into his windrows of compost.

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