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  • How long does corn gluten meal last?

    Created by John S on February 2, 2009 at 7:06 pm

    Hi everybody,

    I want to use corn gluten meal as an organic nitrogen fertilizer for my strawberries and vegetables. When I read about it, I always find that it also works as a herbicide. Can anyone tell me how long (weeks, months) it lasts as an herbicide? If I apply it on my strawberries in May and afterwords in July I sow broccoli I don’t want to have any germination problems.

    Thanks

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  • February 2, 2009 at 7:06 pm #13923

    BIG MURPH
    Member

    I have used corn gluten meal as a pre-emergent herbacide on my lawn, it works pretty well, but you need to apply it again in a couple of weeks for it to be effective. If you work it into the soil as a nitrogen source you should be OK, but I would wait a couple of weeks for it to break down before planting anything.

    June 28, 2016 at 2:43 pm #202976

    Eric Vinje
    Keymaster

    Hi John –

    You are correct that corn gluten meal is a great nitrogen fertilizer, containing about 9%N. However, you must be careful when using it in your vegetable garden. Corn gluten acts as a pre-emergent herbicide and is often spread over lawns to prevent weed seeds from germinating. But, it is not specific to weeds and will discourage most seeds from germinating — including garden seeds — if the timing of its application coincides with germination. One application will last 5-6 weeks so time your planting accordingly.

    Note: Corn gluten does absolutely nothing to weeds that have already germinated and will not harm transplants/ seedlings that may be going into the garden.

    https://www.planetnatural.com/product/corn-gluten-meal-50-lb/

    Hope this helps!

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