Of COURSE I know Scotts isn’t paying the Washington Post (right?) but one little item in yesterday’s Source Section did boggle the mind.
The offending text is here, under "How Do I Not Screw Up?" In what was otherwise a fine little piece about what plants to grow in pots, reporter Dan Zak wrote: "All plants need sunlight and water, but they also need plant food. Basic Miracle-Gro or a comparable product will do the trick." Dan, Dan, Dan. Please scroll down to the previous post here and read the section about fertilizers, or consult any environmentally responsible gardening authority in the world. And here’s a handy compilation of articles about overfertilization.
Moving on, here’s the nice part: a gallery of 4 pots planted up for different purposes. My favorites are of coure the one by Ed Bruske – number 2, for edibles, and number 4 by Kathy Jentz, the "Tough to Kill" design.
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No, the Post is not on Scotts’ payroll as far as I know. In fact, I try to avoid naming specific products when possible. But MiracleGro, as a food supplement to watering, came up a couple of times (never negatively) when I was talking to plant people, and it just found its way into the piece as a basic, recognizable example. Unfortunately the topic of feeding did not come up with someone like Ed Bruske, who, of course, is a major proponent of composting and other organic alternatives and, in his urban gardeners list-serv, has already taken me to task for mentioning MiracleGro. I wish I’d been directed to you, though, Susan. We learn something new every day. Thanks for reading, commenting, criticizing and linking.
Poor Dan. I have a good idea how much work he put into that piece. He talked to me for almost an hour, and he interviewed lots of other people. But that’s always the risk of being a generalist-type reporter, a few errant words can bring the roof down. But as my wife never tires of reminding me, it wasn’t so long ago that I was unaware what was actually in those turquoise crystals in the MiracleGro bag. Welcome to the world of organics, Dan.
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