Sporting Field fertiliser
Wormtec Worm Farming and Vermiculture even fertilise sporting fields and school grounds with our Wormtec Worm Extract Fertiliser.
“I first got involved with sporting fields, when a school I was working with asked if we could get there grass to thicken up and to get it to actively grow as it had bare patches everywhere, was full of weeds and was rock hard, also because of the patch grass the children were getting bitten by ants all the time.”
Why go Organic
Chemical fertilisers have a negative effect on our soils, promoting soil compaction, killing soil microbes so this stops nutrient cycling plus promotes thatch build up, the other side is do you really want to be breathing in this chemical and be getting it on your skin whilst playing sport or maintaining these ovals
Main Problem
One of the main problems with sporting fields is soil compaction, if you look at school ovals with 800 kids on and off the oval all day playing sport, at break times, before and after school its a huge problem. but one that is so easy to fix as long as you move away from chemical fertilisers as they are part of the problem.
Soil compaction is the main problem with sporting fields. If you look at a the number of people utilising a sporting field, all this foot traffic compacting the soil pushing all the air out of the soil and making the soil rock hard so both water and air have trouble entering the soil. But soil compaction is so easy to fix as long as you move away from chemical fertilisers as they are part of the problem.
The other problem the we see over and over again is soil PH levels, your soil should be around PH neutral ( PH 7 ) I like to see a PH around the 6.4 but we often find PH levels around the PH 3 on sporting fields this is normally for a chemical fertilised sporting field.
Testing
One of the first jobs is testing the soil PH as most ovals have been drowned in chemical for years, so bring the PH back to around 6.4, we then check the soil compaction so we have a reference point. Grass and turf is unable put its roots down into the soil profile if the compaction pressure is over 300 psi of compaction pressure the roots will just grow sideways in the top centimeter of soil.
I always test the soil for compaction and PH levels before we do any fertilising at all, both compaction and PH control any outcome, so they both need to be taken into account from the start.
Secondary Problem
We know synthetic fertilisers cause soil compaction, they also have a detrimental effect on soil microbe’s populations each time you apply chemical fertilisers you kill more and more beneficial soil microbes. Soil microbes live in the soil and open up the soil by living in the pore spaces and collinating each and every soil particle, this allows both air and water easy entry into the soil profile so if you kill off the soil microbes the soil will become compacted from foot traffic and vehicle traffic on the oval.
The Cure That We Use
Soil Biology is the key to de-compacting sporting ovals, and eliminating thatch layers, so by inoculating your soil with beneficial soil microbes that we have extracted from worm castings into our Wormtec Worm Extract Fertiliser you can eliminate both compaction and thatch problems in the one go without having to use aerators or detaching machinery.
What could be easier? Spray your oval or sporting field with our biology based fertiliser and let mother nature repair the damage.
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