The Paul James Report: Mycorrhizal Fungi and Lawn Care

This is the first installment of a new feature here - reporting the latest teachings of Paul James on "Gardening by the Yard," then discussing same and soliciting reader feedback.  Why?  Because he teaches my kind of gardening - sustainable, organic, all-around ecofriendly and always gardening-loving.  I’ll just be reporting the highlights, though, because not every topic he covers is of interest to me or this site. 

PAUL HEARTS FUNGI

To bring back to life a neighbor’s ailing tree, Paul drills holes all around it, then stuffs them full of compost that’s been injected with mycorrhizal fungi.  Never shy to go out on a limb, Paul proclaims: "I’m convinced that Mycorrhizal fungi represent the future of gardening.  They dramatically increases the roots’ ability to take up nutrients and fight disease."  Their use leads to "improved growth, longer life, less need for fertilizer, and healthier plants"  And he says using synthetic fertilizers is "treating your plant as though it’s some kind of botanical junkie."  Contrasted with "the natural way" with these amazing fungi.   I usually use a slightly different analogy when steering people away from synthetic fertilizers, calling them simply "steroids".   Fair?  How would you describe their effect on soils and the plants in them?

Here’s more about these fungi from the New York Botanical Garden, and the photo comes from that page.

LAWN

In a wide-ranging segment about turfgrasses, we learn that the warm season ones that Paul grows in Tulsa spread aggressively (the "I" word does spring to mind) and need to be contained somehow.  This got me wondering about the cool season grasses that are grown here in Maryland.  They do spread, but would we call them aggressive? 

I swear, half of gardening is getting our plants to grow and the other half is working even harder to control all that growth. 

Paul recommends giving lawns an inch of water once or twice every week, which seems like a lot to me.  Is that because the warm weather grasses will die without it?  I’ve always let me fescue go dormant and it’s always come back in the fall, so I don’t understand suggestions like these.  Is it because the average viewer is just not ready to embrace brown grass?

As to feeding lawns, he recommends organic fertilizers - Paul’s been pushing organics for decades - in early spring and late fall.  He says one test showed that doing that for one year reduced the crabgrass population by 75 percent.  Good one!  It’s why everyone’s telling us that the best way to deal with weeds is to have a nice thick lawn that’ll out-compete them.  But it sure runs directly counter to the romantic belief that everything’s best in our landscapes when we leave it alone, not even add fertilizer to our unsustainable turfgrasses, and just let the whole garden "do its thing."  Well, I’m one former hippie who’ll never forget the body odor that naturally results from that particular philosophy, as good as it may feel.   Bottom line: if you don’t want your "lawn" to be increasingly splotchy and weed-dominated, feed it!   Select almost any combination of  grass clippings, clover, corn gluten meal, compost or any other organic fertilizer - your choice - as long as it’s getting sufficient nitrogen to keep it thriving.