Does Your Garden Need a Little TLP?

Before we ever put in a garden, we should start a compost pile, but most of us start gardening and as we learn, we realize that we need to make more compost. Then we start collecting kitchen scraps, leaves, grass cuttings, and cow, horse or other manure, if we have a source for it, either a dairy, stable, or by the bag at our local building or gardening center. The problem with the later, is that if we don’t have a pickup truck, bringing the manure home, is a little inconvenient. Manure stinks and even the thin bags at the garden center always seem to have holes in them and our car smells like manure for a long while.

What’s the solution, besides renting or borrowing a truck?

I had the same dilemma and I drive a sports wagon, where I don’t even have the illusion of a trunk to separate me from the odiferous manures, but I came up with a better solution when I was doing the research for my Master Composter class project at the Solana Center: I discovered the multiple benefits of using “TLP”, “P” as in pee or urine.. It goes by other names among enthusiast, such as Liquid Organic Fertilizer, Homemade Compost Activator, and, my favorite, Liquid Gold. Liquid Gold has many benefits for the gardener and composter. It is always available, it is inexpensive (free), it is a good NPK fertilizer, it is easy to apply, it is easily absorbed by the plants, it is safe to use, it has minimum odor when used fresh, it is a great compost activator, and it’s use is backed up by research and practical application around the world; even the astronauts on the Space Station use it.

Liquid Gold is readily available; we only have to collect it. Each of us could supply enough urine to fertilize around 6300 tomato plants a year and tomatoes are heavy feeders. This would yield 2.41 tons in just one season. Most of us urinate into a flush toilet that is filled with drinking water that has been purified by our water district and then flush it away. We are wasting a great source of natural fertilizer, using precious drinking water in an arid, drought prone region each time we flush the toilet. When I started collecting urine instead of flushing it, my water usage was down 38%, by just flushing pee down the  toilet, so it is not only inexpensive, it can save on your water bill and conserve precious water instead of adding to sewage waste pollution.

Urine is a great NPK source, NPK is a fertilizer that is very high in nitrogen, low in phosphorus, and moderate in potassium, the average Westerner’s urine has a NPK ration of 11-1-2.5. Pee also contains urea, creatine, ammonia, uric acids, salt, calcium, magnesium, and sulfur., but it is 95% water.

Pee is easy to collect in a “Super Size” cup and poured into a larger container with a  top seal. This collection method is good for both sexes. My wife and I find it convenient and we bring the filled and capped bottles down to the compost area or use it directly or diluted in our garden, depending upon the plants, their needs, and whether they are in the ground or in pots. The NPK is in a form that can be readily absorbed by the plants and unlike other “teas” for the garden, doesn’t need to be steeped. As a Urine Tea, simply dilute it 1:20 and use on your garden or potted plants. If you don’t it all within 2 or 3 days, pour it into your compost or under your perennials.

Pee is safe to use; actually must safer than animal manure, which can be a source of e coli unless properly composted. Research around the world has shown that urine has little risk of contamination of urine-borne pathogens as they would be in competition with the microorganisms in the soil or compost bin and lose. Urine is relatively clean substance. Urine has a minimum odor when used fresh, any smell is caused by the conversion into ammonia gas, which represents a loss of nitrogen, which is why we want to use it soon after collection (1 or 2 days) so as to keep the most nutrients for our soil.

Pee is a great compost activator as it will feed the microorganism that break down the browns, the dried leaves, straw, and paper in our compost. It helps keep the temperature high for complete and fast breakdown of the raw materials and turning them into ‘”black gold” for our gardens. Pee is recycled on board the international space station as a NPK source for their hydroponic gardens, so it is not only an old technology, it is also cutting edge for space exploration in the 21^st century.

Isn’t it time you gave your garden a little TLP?