Weve offered the Raleigh community

space-saving solutions for the past 10

years. We recommend Northwind Traders

to anyone who will listen to us. They
helped us reclaim over 700 square feet of
Global
warming is real. It is hapour house! - Annie D. Balitmore

pening today the real key is if

we are ready to admit that fact
and take the action to make
the necessary conversion.
Dianne Feinstein

EFFECTS OF
INORGANIC
FERTILIZERS
REDUCING YOUR ENVIRONMENTAL

Negative Impacts of Inorganic

Background
Phosphorus is a chemical found in
many fertilizers, as it greatly helps
plants survive and thrive into a beautiful vegetable garden or plant bed.

However, there are two types of

phosphorus fertilizer: organic and inorganic.
Organic
Organic phosphorus fertilizer comes
from living things (for instance, in the
form of manure) and needs to be
broken down by decomposers in the
soil before its nutrients can be used.
Inorganic
Inorganic phosphorus fertilizer comes
from nonliving matter (like rocks) and
contains the chemicals in a readily
available form, so they are quickly
absorbed by plants.

Because the chemicals in inorganic fertilizers dont need to be

broken down, they are often
leached, or washed away by irrigation and rain into groundwater, lakes, and rivers.
When phosphorus concentrations increase, algae and water
weed growth multiplies, a phenomenon called eutrophication.
When algae decomposes, bacteria growth is boosted. This consumes high levels of oxygen and
decrease the dissolved oxygen
concentration. Lakes and ponds
go into hypoxic states of little oxygen, and are called dead
zones.

These dead zones are lethal to

aquatic life, which quickly die
from oxygen deprivation.

The deaths of aquatic and plant

life greatly reduces the biodiversity of water bodies and causes
the loss of many organisms important to the ecosystem and
food chain.

How You Can Help

Avoid using chemical fertilizers

choose organic instead!

Benefit: Organic fertilizers dont

need to be applied as often

Takes longer to break down so

plants have time to absorb chemicals

Examples of organic fertilizer: manure, compost, soy meal

Improves soil quality

Help spread the word!

Raising awareness is one of the

best ways to solve an issue

The more people who know, the

bigger the impact

Lake filled with algal bloom due to high

concentrations of phosphorus