How to Make Organic Fertilizer: Homemade, Easy, & Free Jenny Graham, August 8, 2025August 8, 2025 If you’re trying to grow a lush, productive garden without relying on store-bought fertilizer or chemical fertilizers, you’re in the right place. Learning how to make organic fertilizer at home is not only simple, it’s sustainable, affordable, and so rewarding. Make Organic Fertilizer at Home for Free Whether you’re feeding a vegetable garden, fruit trees, or even just a few ornamental plants, homemade fertilizer gives you more control over what goes into your soil and ultimately, what goes into your food. And the best part? You can make organic fertilizer with things you already have around your house. Let’s dig in and explore how you can make organic fertilizer using organic materials you already have on hand. Why Make Organic Fertilizer at Home? Homemade fertilizers offer a ton of benefits: They’re practically free. You know exactly what’s in them. No mystery chemicals. They help to build healthy soil, which grows healthy plants. They’re a great way to repurpose food waste, animal manure, and garden scraps. Commercial fertilizers often contain synthetic ingredients, sewage sludge, and who knows what else. Not ideal when you’re trying to grow edible plants for your family. When you make organic fertilizer, you’re embracing a more sustainable agriculture model, which is better for the environment, your garden, and your wallet. Start With a Compost Pile If you don’t already have a compost pile, now’s the time. It’s the heart of any organic fertilizing system. Composting breaks down organic matter like food scraps, grass clippings, banana peels, coffee grounds, dry landscape clippings, and cardboard into a rich, crumbly amendment packed with essential nutrients. What to Include: Food scraps Egg shells (great for calcium!) Grass clippings Vegetable peels Banana peels Coffee grounds Shredded newspaper or cardboard Leaves and small twigs Avoid using large amounts of one thing. Layer your greens (wet stuff like food waste) and browns (dry stuff like cardboard and leaves) to successfully make organic fertilizer. I have found that a ratio of 1 green to 2-3 browns is a good starting point to successfully make compost. Make Organic Fertilizer with Compost Tea If you’ve got a compost pile, you can easily make compost tea, a type of liquid fertilizer loaded with good bacteria, trace elements, and essential nutrients. It’s basically like giving your plants a smoothie packed with goodness. Some folks would even say it’s liquid gold! How to Make Compost Tea: Add one shovel of compost to a 5-gallon bucket. Fill with water (preferably non-chlorinated). Let it steep for 3-5 days, stirring daily. Strain and use on your plants! This basic recipe can be supercharged by adding a dash of molasses and a fish tank bubbler while it brews for a few days. Use this nutrient-rich brew on garden beds, outdoor plants, and even your indoor potted friends. Compost tea will feed the soil by adding nutrients, microbes, and beneficial bacteria, while improving the soil structure and feeding plant roots without any chemical runoff. Make Organic Fertilizer with a Barrel of Swamp Water My friend, David the Good, taught me an incredibly easy way to make organic fertilizer, using only weeds and water! Take all those weeds, landscape clippings, chicken manure, or really anything organic and submerge it in a barrel of water. Put a top on it and let it rot down for several weeks. Swamp water can then be used to water your plants or as a foliar spray. I will warn you though, the smell is something else. It’s not for the weak! Homemade Fertilizer Recipes There’s lots of kitchen scraps you can use to make organic fertilizer to use when your plants need a quick boost. Let’s look at some easy organic fertilizers you can whip up for different needs in your garden. Banana Peel Fertilizer (For Flowering & Fruiting Plants) Banana peels are rich in potassium and phosphorus, which is great for blossom end rot in tomatoes and peppers. Chop up peels and bury them near your plant roots. Bonus points if you ferment them in a Bokashi Bin first. Or soak peels in water for a few days to make a fertilizer concentrate. Use 1 part banana peel water to 5 parts water as a foliar spray or root drench. Egg Shell Calcium Boost Egg shells contain calcium carbonate, which strengthens cell walls and helps prevent blossom end rot. Rinse and dry shells. Crush into a fine powder. Mix into your garden soil or compost. As an added bonus, add some Epsom Salts Coffee Grounds for Nitrogen High nitrogen content is vital for leafy greens like brussels sprouts, brassicas, kale, and lettuce. Sprinkle small quantities of used grounds directly into the soil. My houseplants love this! Or compost them for later use. Great for acid-loving plants like blueberries and azaleas, but avoid overuse which can acidify soil too much. Complete Organic Fertilizer Recipe (Inspired by Steve Solomon) Steve Solomon’s complete organic fertilizer recipe is a classic among home gardens. It’s customizable and works well in small scale or large gardens. Spoiler alert, this one is not free! Basic Recipe: 4 parts seed meals (like cotton seeds or soybean meal) for protein content and nitrogen 1 part lime (either dolomitic lime or calcium carbonate) One part phosphate rock or soft rock phosphate 1 part kelp meal for trace elements One part blood meal or fish emulsion for nitrogen Optional: 1 part bone meal for phosphorus Use 1 quart of this mix per 100 square feet of garden beds. Just mix it into the soil before planting to get your garden off to a good start. More Awesome Fertilizer Sources Looking to level up your homemade fertilizer game? Here are some lesser-known but powerful ingredients: Aquarium Water If you keep freshwater fish tanks, that dirty tank water is a secret weapon. It’s full of amino acids, nutrients, and good bacteria, which is perfect for watering plants. Human Urine (Yep, You Read That Right) Diluted at a 10:1 ratio (10 parts water to 1 part urine), it’s an excellent source of nitrogen. Apply to high-demand vegetables like corn or cabbage. Just don’t get caught peeing in the bucket in the garden! Rice Water The starchy water left after rinsing rice is full of vitamins and minerals. Pour it directly onto your plants for a gentle nutrient boost. Chicken Manure & Cow Manure These are classics for a reason. Just make sure it’s dry, aged manure, as fresh, wet manure can burn your plants because of the high nitrogen. Spread it across your vegetable garden or mix it ,into compost. Warning, be cautious using cow manure from cows that are fed hay that could have been sprayed with persistent herbicides. Chop & Drop It doesn’t get easier than this. You can use landscape clippings or other plants in your garden to chop and drop or just add some leaves. While it does take a while to feed your plants, waiting for the plant matter to break down, it is a free and easy way to feed your garden. It also doubles as a ground cover, keeping weeds down and moisture in. How to Make Organic Fertilizer for Specific Needs Organic Fertilizer For Acid-Loving Plants Use coffee grounds, pine needles, or a vinegar-water mix (1 tbsp vinegar per 1 gallon of water). Avoid alkaline materials like lime. Organic Fertilizer For Flowering Plants Boost with phosphorus-rich fertilizers like bone meal, banana peel fertilizer, or high-phosphate guano. Organic Fertilizer For Leafy Greens Go heavy on high nitrogen materials like grass clippings, chicken manure, blood meal, and fish emulsion. Troubleshooting Common Fertilizer Issues Making your own homemade fertilizer is super satisfying—but you want to be sure it’s working. If your plants are struggling, it may be time to review your ingredients or get soil test results from a local extension office. If your plants are missing something, they will certainly tell you. Yellowing leaves = nitrogen deficiency Blossom end rot = calcium deficiency Poor flowering = phosphorus deficiency Stunted growth = low overall fertility In most cases, adjusting your mix or adding a missing component (like dolomitic lime, bone meal, or kelp meal) can fix the issue quickly. Also, don’t overdo it. Excess fertilizers can harm your plants just as much as deficiencies. More isn’t always better. Where Store-Bought Fertilizer Falls Short While you can always find organic options at garden centers but even the best store-bought fertilizer often lacks the living organisms that help build true soil fertility. Except for worm castings, they are one of the best organic fertilizers money can buy. Unlike some store-bought fertilizers, homemade organic fertilizer can boost your garden in so many ways. Feeds the soil, not just the plants Encourages good bacteria and fungi Builds soil structure Adds organic matter Costs you zero dollars Homemade organic fertilizers are sustainable That’s a win all around if you ask me! You’ll Be So Glad You Learned to Make Organic Fertilizer Learning how to make organic fertilizer isn’t just for seasoned gardeners or big farms. It’s for everyone, from backyard growers with a few pots on the patio to homesteaders who want to grow a ton of food. Start with what you have. Mix, test, observe, and adjust. Over time, your garden will reward you with stronger plants, tastier food, and soil that just keeps getting better year after year. So go ahead, skip the synthetic stuff. Unlock the power of homemade plant food, natural fertilizers, and compost tea. Your garden (and your wallet) will thank you. If you want to learn more about composting, you may enjoy reading one of the many composting articles in our library. Dig in! Happy Homesteading & Gardening, Jenny @ The GrahamStead Family Farm Jenny and her family have been homesteading for more than two decades. They currently live on a 10-acre farm in Northeast Florida, which they built from the ground up, nine years ago. On their farm, they grow 100% of their meat and most of their vegetables. With a small herd of Aberdeen Angus cattle, pastured poultry, sheep, and seasonal pigs, they not only meet their family’s meat needs but also sell their surplus to the local community. They are dedicated to sustainable practices like making compost, seed saving, and processing much of their garden and animal harvests at home. You can find Jenny wandering through her garden, making herbal tinctures, preserving food, making bone broth, and one of Jenny’s favorite hobbies, tanning all types of hides. Gardening Homesteading