There are virtually no regulations on gardening products. Manufacturers can say just about anything about their products even if the claims are not true. They don’t need to back up their claims with scientific evidence. As a result of this, there are useless products on the market. Some don’t work at all, and some are just bad ideas.
Over the years I have written about many such products. This post is a list of all of those products, making it easy for you to find them. For more information on any item, just click on the title link.
Bone Meal Organic Fertilizer
Bone meal is a organic fertilizer that is routinely recommended for gardens and especially for planting bulbs. It is a good source of phosphorus but most gardens have enough phosphorus. Most gardeners should not be adding phosphorus.
Jiffy Peat Pellets
Jiffy peat pellets, also called Jiffy pellets and Jiffy-7, are a convenient way to start seeds. Just add water to the small pellets and they expand, ready for us. This all sounds like a good idea, but how well do plants grow? Are the pellets bio-degradable in the garden?
Vitamin B1 for Plants
Vitamin B1 is that miracle drug that makes all plants grow bigger especially after transplanting. It is added to several different kinds of fertilizer and plant additives. Guess what – it doesn’t work.
Landscape Fabric – Weed Barrier Cloth
Landscape fabric, weed barrier and weed barrier fabric are names for the same product. They are advertised to keep weeds out of the garden, but they don’t work. They also prevent water from reaching your plant roots.
Square Foot Gardening Box
The idea of square foot gardening has become popular over the last few years and some of the underlying concepts of the this gardening technique make sense. Buying a plastic box to do this kind of gardening makes NO sense at all.
Fish Fertilizer – Is it Worth Buying?
Fish fertilizer is reported to offer special benefits due to the proteins and oils, but your plants can’t use these until they are converted to nutrients in the soil–lust like any other organic fertilizer. On a $/lb nitrogen basis, fish fertilizer is a ridiculous price. Unless you have cheap access to fish, other organic fertilizers are a much better buy and offer the same benefits.
Anvil or Bypass Secateurs
There are two types of secateurs, also called pruners; bypass and anvil. If you are using an anvil pruner for most of your pruning needs – you are using the wrong tool.
Soil pH Testers
Soil pH testers that are sold for garden use do not have enough accuracy to be of much help.
Mycorrhizal Fungi Inoculant Products
There is no doubt that mycorrhizae play an important role in plant growth. They grow naturally in your soil and you don’t need to buy them for your garden.
Hand Garden Cultivator
This garden tool is designed for weeding and loosening the surface of your soil. You see them everywhere and I always wondered why people buy them??? I’ve never found any use for them.
Invasive Plants
This is a list of invasive plants you should never, never, never add to your garden–unless you want them everywhere.
Blossom End Rot Sprays
Blossom End Rot is not caused by a calcium deficiency, as believed by most people. Consequently Blossom End Rot sprays that apply calcium can not work. See the post on the real cause of Blossom End Rot for details.
Hummingbird Nectar Food
Hummingbird nectar food is easy and cheap to make and you don’t need the red colored dye. There is no point in buying a commercial product.
Orchid Media in White Plastic Bags
This orchid product has the consistency of soil, and is far too fine for growing orchids, which need a very airy chunky media. If you can’t see inside the bag don’t buy it.
Sunlight Calculator
The sunlight calculator is a fancy electronic way to look at the shady areas in your garden. You can easily do the same thing with paper and pencil – I’ll show you how.
Dog Rocks
Dog Rocks are sold to reduce the nitrates in drinking water, thereby reducing burnt lawn spots from your dog. They do not work!
Miracle-Gro Orchid Plant Food Mist
Miracle-Gro Orchid Plant Food Mist is a foliar spray for orchids. Foliar sprays do not work well on orchids and this is an extremely expensive way to buy fertilizer. I’ll show you how to save $2,440.
There is a new product called Organic Pro GRG or some such thing promoted by LESCO, which apparently has 50 percent composted pog manure and some organic stuff and soil beneficial bacteria and mycorrhizae, pattelised for ease of application. Recommended rate is 5-10 pound per 100 square ft of lawn, repeated monthly. Wonder if you have any comment on this! thank you!
The organic material is always good, they microbes a waste of money, and the less processing the better for the environment.
I’m fine with the concept of biosolids, but I read that the overabundance of microplastics is now compromising their usefulness. “Fields of plastic glistening in the sun” is a phrase that sticks in the mind!
I just read your article on Mycorrhizal Fungi and i know a lot of people who swear by it in many communities. Ive had people say if there are few things they would use in their garden it would be MYCOs and Avos
Ask them to provide the scientific support for their position. Lots of people believe lots of misinformation.
Ask the company why they no longer guarantee your trees planted with it for 5 yrs. I worked at a garden centre when they first introduced mycorrhiza. We got the spiel and had to push a box with every tree sold. They just wanted to hook us.
I use the hand cultivator to remove pebbles from my soil. Just because you don’t have a use for it doesn’t mean that other people don’t.
Don’t the pebbles just pass through the tines?
It’s great for dealing with the worm farm (lifting the top bedding) and pulling out bindweed by the roots. I use it hard to reach, small places for pulling weeds or spreading compost.
The article on DEET fails to mention that it’s a carcinogen and neurotoxin. So the somewhat smug-sounding statement “do you want to catch Zika” should perhaps be asking “do you want to have cancer”?
I live right next to an 18,000 acre salt marsh and I’ve had excellent results with sprays made from essential oils like cedar and others. No, they don’t last as long as DEET – you have to reapply frequently. But you won’t get some terrible disease years later.
Before dismissing these fears as irrational, consider that the United States is in the midst of a massive cancer epidemic as we speak. We have more cancer per capita than any other place on this Earth. I am living with chronic health issues from contracting cancer at age 20 and my sister got it at age 40 and no one back to our great-grandparents in the family ever had cancer before.
Cancer is not a concern for DEET.
Re: “We have more cancer per capita than any other place on this Earth.” – That is just fear mongering – why not check your facts before posting?
https://www.wcrf.org/dietandcancer/cancer-trends/data-cancer-frequency-country
These slug control methods may have already been addressed but just in case…
I tested under controlled conditions ( 10 slugs put in the center of each material in a plastic bucket) many slug products and nearly all were marginally useful or not at all. A “Slug Bar” roll of green plastic by Nortene made a nice slug climbing gym. They also happily walked all over small volcanic rocks (pouzzolane) and over human hair. There was a slight effect for diatomaceous earth-based cat litter but pure powdery diatomaceous earth would possibly be more effective, at least when dry.
Two products were quite effective when fresh and dry: wood ash and a calcium carbonate powder sold as slug barrier. Both lost effectiveness signicantly when wetted and still did not work when allowed to dry out.
(My most effective method is unfortunately to hunt them constantly, by putting out big pieces of cardboard, then removing all slugs sheltering under them each morning. This had driven down the population significantly but at some cost of time.)
Hello, I recently discovered your articles on orchids. Thank you so very much. Hopefully I won’t kill my latest purchase. I also saw this article on garden myths (re. slugs). I live in Indiana and slugs were devouring my hostas. I put some beer in a dish, and voilà, the slugs got drunk and died. I also discovered the slimy buggers do NOT like Lite beer–only the good stuff will do!!
What about biochar?
https://www.facebook.com/groups/GardenFundamentals/permalink/523487434788357/
Here’s another product which is a complete rip off:
Bamboo fertilizer. People cherrish their bamboos an they want them to grow well. But if one takes a closer look at the labels one sees that the composition of bamboo fertilizer is almost the same as for lawn fertilizer. This make sense, since bamboo is basically a kind of grass that just grows very tall. It produces a lot o green growth and no flowers so it requires a high nitrogen fraction.
You may argue that no fertilzer is needed, but if one is to fertilize bamboo he can safely use lawn fertilizer at a fraction of thecost of bamboo fertilizer.
There is no such thing as specialized fertilizer. Unless you have a soil test done, all you know is that the soil probably can benefit from some nitrogen, provided you have not been adding a lot of organics.
Specialized fertilizers are just marketing gimmicks.
“Specialized fertilizers are just marketing gimmicks.” Yes this is very true. We prefer the unbranded ones that you can find on eBay. The money that you can save on the “specialized” can be used to buy these unbranded one in bulk. They give the same results more or less.
Two more for your list: Nuke-em from Flying Skull Plant Products, SEA-90 from SeaAgri, Pure snake oil.