Regarding the "slow start" with the fish heads: Its important to understand that speed of growth doesn't necessarily indicate better performance. While the fish head plants didn't grow as tall it first, they had greener leaves. This indicates a higher chlorophyll concentration, which was better supported by the nitrogen content of the fish. Because of this, the greener plants were better able to produce food than the no fish head plants, so they didn't have to spend more energy growing taller and could instead put more energy into establishing leaf and flower buds as well as a better root system. This allows the plants to be stronger and more productive in the long run. The no fish head plants had to invest more energy in growing taller in an effort to collect more sunlight. Furthermore, increased flowering and fruiting is supported by phosphorus, which bones are pretty high in and potassium helps grow better roots. Also lots of iron from blood, which supports both photosynthesis and respiration (converting sugars/starches into energy). One of the reasons that fish waste is used rather than other animals is that fish rots a lot faster, thus releasing nutrients more quickly without causing damage ("fertilizer burn" and bacterial "infection") to the plants. If you had used, say, chicken heads, without composting them first, the nutrients they contain would not be released nearly as quickly and the rotting process would have likely damaged the plant's roots.
This more informatively represents exactly what I was thinking. Though in my mind, I was likening the fish-less plants as having more freedom to grow because they lacked the nutrients available in the fish-plants, so they could fulfill biological processes more quickly. More specifically, I'd equate the process along the lines of carrying a nearly empty bucket is easy (fishless plant) but when you have a bucket that is full, it takes more time/energy to carry it (fish-plant). This may not make sense to others, but it works in my brain lol
@@jimmyjambon9206 Composting is always best, really, even with fish heads. Fortunately, you can get fishmeal, bone meal, blood meal, etc already composted and ready to mix into your soil, as well as composted manure and regular compost. It takes at least a year to make your own compost, and it has to be turned (mixed up) and watered every month or so during growing season to give good quality. You also should NOT put meat scraps in your compost pile, since it'll attract animals, will stink and can introduce pathogens. Also, you should also get your soul tested to see what nutrients it needs before deciding which particular amendments to use, such as blood meal for low iron, bone heal for low calcium and phosphorus, etc.
As a chef working professionally, who understands the amount of food wastage we as a society foster, this video makes me very happy. Thank you for sharing!
the issue with closed loop zero waste systems is it gives us to much power and out put this is why we are trained to belive there is waste at all; and prevented from using certain wastes or having a certian amount of animals to produce the valuable fertilizer.
As a former farmer I am still stunned at the waste, produce not selected because it was not "perfect" or (as a cook) noticing the huge amounts left on restaurant plates.
You take over 8 months to create a full detailed video experiment for us to learn and enjoy. Most people wouldve said the fish head didnt work because it grew slower at the beginning and posted a video earlier. Keep up the amazing posts
Reasons I love this channel: 1. The commitment you put into your videos and backyard project 2. The genuine joy and the passion we see in you 3. On point content, less yapping and more on demonstration 4. Dad jokes. Lots of it
I couldn't say it better Hernandez. "Hey, I'm just a backyard food-gardener hack, who's tryin' to have some fun... ...dig it?" Mark really has no ego, does he? I arrive to spend a few minutes and lose hours here, just learning and laughing.
Hi, Mark. When the Native American Indians used to grow the Three Sisters (corn, beans and squash) together out in the desert, they always buried a fish in the mound where they planted the seeds. People have been doing this for thousands of years. It's proven to work.
when the English first arrived in NAmerica, their crops wouldn't grow in the sandy soil near the shore and many settlers died of starvation. the natives taught them to bury fish in their fields and this one trick allowed the settlers to flourish. the settlers thanked the natives by killing them and stealing their land.
Nope. There is little evidence of fish being used to grow crops prior to European contact. Squanto probably learned to bury fish under the crops while he was in Europe and taught it to the pilgrims and the members of his tribe when he came back.
@@bvbxiong5791 Settlers just practicing the culture the natives have practiced for thousands of years, of genociding eachother and then claiming that land is theirs simply because nobody else who lived there is alive to say otherwise
@@bvbxiong5791 Are you under the impression the Native Americans were just a bunch of Tree-Hugging Gardeners? Because it is plainly well documented that the majority of these Tribes practiced war, genocide, and enslavement as well... Welcome to the Old World cupcake- everyone did it.
My dog passed away, and we buried her in our backyard, and planted some roses above her grave as a testament to our love for her, and for how much beauty she brought to our lives. The roses grew so well! Recently, a pet chicken died, and I buried her next to the roses and the roses blossomed again. It's about 10 feet tall now.
@@Dman6779 Chickens that die of old age don't taste very good. I personally butcher egg hens once they stop laying, and they're really only good for stew.
The root growth was stunted because you created 'hot' compost. When Native Americans did this, they planted the fish in fall, giving time for decomposition to happen. Then, they would plant their vegetables in spring. Thank you for your hard work and observations!
@@sasfishadventures9729 compost that hasnt fully decomposed. Usually very high concentrated load of chemicals in a state that pseudo poisons the plant from nutrient overload.
"I'm no scientist." "For the last couple of decades I've been conducting experiments and that's how I find things out." You just described what a scientist does. You don't need a fancy degree to do good science, you just need the will and effort to conduct these experiments
That kind of thinking can get you in a camp for Re-education. 🤪😛😜😝 ᛏ Who is those, them & they in the back? It's the struggle. Documented in history and secret societies. Pushing ideaoligies that define our future. INFILTRATING CONQUEST THROUGH MANHANDLING, REQUIRED GUIDANCE , ANTI NATURAL SELECTION, DECISIONS OF EMOTIONS WITH VANITY. FORCED APPEASAL TO SOCIAL JUSTICE AND NEUTRALITY, AND PEACE AT ALL COST ...Including prostrations. While being dependant with emotional safety and diversity for unity as legion. VERSUS ALLURING RENAISSANCE, CIVILITY, FREEWILL WITHIN A BALANCE, INGENUITY AND CODE OF CONDUCT. DIFFERENCES BETWEEN PERCEPTIONS WITH A DISTINCTION BETWEEN HUMAN ANIMALS AND BEINGS. PEACE WITH STRENGTH...All parties stand tall. While being independent with compassion to kindred for unity as Tribal. The struggle is real. The dark consciousness is the real cause. Laugh all you want. But it fits the world view puzzle. All the way back to sumarian tablets. It's like two parents arguing and trying to get the child to choose. With the dark feeding us things such as WE ARE ONLY HUMAN... WE ARE THE SAME , We are victims and fighting back as a Samaritan is evil and vigilantism. Everyone's voice matters beyond concideration... However, ideas must be approved & requiring leagalnese or a doctorate to be qualified. BS. The core thought IS being a distinction between human animals and human beings: CHOOSE. STILL GRABBING THE BLUE PILL? RELAX TO THE MOVIE "JOHN CARTER".. Even non-fiction can have insight.
The reason it is greener, and not necessarily larger is the result of nitrogen released from the fish head. As it decays, the nitrogen is released into the soil and the plant benefits. Also, it synthesizes sunlite more efficiently and turns a darker green. End rusult, bigger, redder , tomatoes...
Yeah, light green/yellowish leafs are slightly nitrogen deficient. But if the plants were bigger and growing faster then they would require more nitrogen anyway. So if both sets of plants had exactly the same amount of nitrogen but one set grew bigger, then they'd look lighten in colour anyway.
Actually tomato plants are kinda carnivorous.....The leaves have tinysharp hairlike structures ....Insects get killed on contact and fall near roots where they are absorbed.... ..It's always been
Unfortunately, the reality of veganism is absolute, denial. Planting vegetables require a lot of animal bi-products to grow efficiently (yes, feathers, bones, fish scrap, manure, that's ALL animal bi-product.) -In the movie The Lion King, where Mufasa explains "When we die, our bodies go in the grass, and the antelope eats the grass. So we are all connected to the great circle of life." Actually has more truth than most people realize. But no, Vegans want to believe they have no relevance to the food chain, so they must think they are gods or fairies or something.
Some of our (Australia) river systems have been inundated with introduced European Carp for many years. Bounties have been placed on their capture resulting in an industry that processes the Carp into garden products. There are commercial products available at reasonable prices that work very well.
@Imran nawaz I live on the east coast of USA. The carp in my river tastes like mud... but also has so many tiny bones. Do Pakistani carp have a lot of tiny bones? The catfish are very good here. And bass.
@Imran nawaz... I saw a man who spent a fortune cleaning up his pond... but he showed it was possible. 30 years ago you could see your feet to the bottom of my river from your waist. Now your feet disappear before they are covered. Boats. Farm runoff. Land and forest degradation. Wish I had a time machine. Or could go live in a unknown tribe.
I'm sure the soil you brushed back over looked even more healthy and brown and full of goodness than it started out as - it reminds me of the documentary on the symbiotic relationship between Canadian big forests - salmon - and bears - and how bears catching salmon and munching on them on-land and leaving the bits behind to become fertilizer is an important feature in keeping the forests alive.
An addition to that relationship was discovered in the last few years: wolves too catch salmon but don't eat them at the forest edge the way that bears do: they go roughly 100 metres into the forest to eat their catches. This results in a second band of more vigorous tree growth near the streams.
Michorrizhae travel nutrients underground to Redwoods away from the water, way inland... I don't know how far, but its astounding! Trees ask for the nutrients and the michorrizhae comply for the sweet sugar the tree provides, and they form chains for miles!
My grandfather always used fish heads in his garden , we would go on a number of fishing trips so he had plenty of heads and a years worth of smoked fish . It always seemed to me as a child his garden was immaculate and produced heavy .
I have been using a whole fish and an egg for about 10 years now with incredible results. When everyone else’s tomatoes are struggling, mine are usually thriving. Thanks for reinforcing my theory!
First off, when I said my theory, I certainly didn’t come up with this practice. My grandparents used eggs in the garden and I know if they did, they must have had a good reason. Calcium helps combat blossom end rot and eggs also add much needed nitrogen. It does take quite a while for the eggshells to break down, but when you grow in the same beds year after year I believe it keeps your soil consistent.
Thanks for your comments. I dig the hole at least a foot deep and put the fish and one egg in the bottom, then I take a spade and break them up a bit. One other thing that I have been doing the last couple years is to water with a diluted mix of water and black strap molasses... Seems to make them much sweeter😉
As a recently graduated scientist, I can explain the results found. The intact fish head has lots of nitrogen (N) in it, but it is all plant unavailable (it is solid in the remains). Then organisms start breaking the fish head down, but the microbes doing most of the work require N to grow. So the growing microbes are stealing N from the tomato plant (that's why they were smaller initially). But then the microbe colonies reach a tipping point where they are breaking down more N than they are consuming, so the N becomes plant available and the tomato plant starts benefiting from all that nitrogen. In the end, just know that a little fertilizer along with your fish head will make it all work out much better.
I was going to write something similar 😁 I’ve used fish frames and heads for many years and the results on multiple plant types are awesome. I read somewhere many years ago that there is also valuable quantity of P (phosphorus) in fish and seaweed. P (along with K - potassium) is critical for maximum flower and fruit production. So if you plant the fish heads a little deeper under your plants, you’ll reduce the N deficiency early on as root mass is developing, yet all the N, P and most K will become fully available just as the plant matures. Priceless 👍🏼 Another hack...add blood and bone with a sprinkle of lime at the time of planting seedling. This mitagates N loss to microbes and ensures your soil is ‘sweet’ for the best start
Gifhary Syidhqa Hamim Wanna know some messed up history facts? A lot of lush places use to be battlefields. And yes, nature devouers and the wheel turns. This is why I would like to be buried with no coffin. I would like some type if blu or violet flower on top. I think that would be my last gift from sweat and blood. 🙂
Everything you say is totally 100! But those BONES are terrific throughout the growing cycle for the roots. Tomatoes relish a continuous supply of something like rock phosphate or bone meal or eggshells for the P in NPK. This ensures that their roots will be strong, the plants will produce plenty of flowers & fruit, & they will be less likely to get blossom end rot. The no-fish-head tomatoes probably had initial greater access to phosphorus than the others, as he said the soil was good at the start. But the no-fish plants possibly just ran out...that's what it looked like to me. Obviously the fh plants still had the skulls in the hole, but root hairs and microbes will dissolve bone more slowly than flesh. Tomatoes don't need that much N in comparison to their love of P. I might plant the head an inch or two below such a small seedling. As you said, a bioactive soil is essential (why they love to sprout in compost piles). No doubt your description of the activities of the soil bacteria interacting first with the head, then with the roots, clarifies much of what occurred on this timeline.
When I was a child my father grew 4 beefsteak tomatoes is the same spot year after year and would put the heads, guts, scales and tails in hole about 18 inches down. It worked every year I can remember.
I wasn't going to grow tomatoes because I moved to a place with no garden...but in one of my containers of soil, a bunch of tomatoes came up...late. Not getting much sun, they aren't growing fast. Thank you for reminding me about the fish! That'll work.
Yes sir, I've been putting fish bones, guts, and what's left of a fish filet for years. I concur it works. Been doing it for 17 years. Enjoy your video thanks
I can tell you guys, this is the best YT channel to watch during lockdown. I even started my own container garden a couple of weeks ago with okra, bokchoy, mustard, potatoes, bellpepper and had germinated a squash and watermelon. All of which are doing pretty great in spite of hot weather. Thank you very much Mark for the inspiration.
5:47 As an engineering bachelor's I can say that using scientific methodology for your experiment makes you more of a scientist than 2/3 of academic professors.
Exactly! I am a scientist myself and I found out that what he is doing is better than most of other scientists are doing. No offence to the other scientists, but most of them are doing a lot of experiments which is not practical to the real world. They are concentrating too much on one part and ignored the rest's factors. That is the reason why so many scientists have different results and contradict to one another. They have the brain but do not have the experiences to the real world. I prefer both, academic and practical result as one.
@@fahadus hello there. I meant to say.. we take the guts and innards, feathers or skin, whatever it is that we do not use from the animals burry that and plant a tree on top of it.
I’ve added fish carcass to garden beds with great results. I think the fact you used a large fish head might have set you back a bit. The roots would have to grow around it, whereas if you used a carcass, the roots would grow through it and it decomposes better.
G'day Everyone! It has been a big year! I've made more editing blunders in this video than usual (bit tired) but I know you'll forgive me lol... Thanks for your amazing support. BTW, you know I love raised bed gardening and now I'm happy to announce that I've made a deal with Birdies Raised Garden beds in Australia & New Zealand go to birdiesgardenproducts.com.au/ or birdiesgardenproducts.co.nz/ and use Code SSMEbird for a 5% discount. For USA, go here to get Birdies Raised Garden beds: shop.epicgardening.com/ and use SSME2020 for a 5% discount. Cheers :)
I make a fish emulsion from my fish scraps, it's a 5 gallon paint bucket, with fish scraps, water and a tight closing lid. I let it sit and do it's thing for 3 months in the shade, after the last frost and before planting seedlings I use all of the buckets I have done and fertilizer the raised beds. All of my plants seem to do really well, and they seem to really take off quickly in the spring, I seldom use store bought fertilizers, besides the fish emulsions I do use castings and worm tea on all of the plants through out the summer time and into the fall, during winter when I have my winter crops in I seldom use any additional fertilizers and a seldom water so the roots don't freeze solid.
We went out and caught some albacore and bonito. By the time we got home the bonito was just mush but the albacore was delicious after baking. The bonito went into the ground under the rosebushes. The roses were stunning beautiful that year
Bit late to the party, but I'd like to say you get better results if you till the fish or fish remains into the soil in the fall, letting it decompose over winter. Then you have nice, fertile soil in the spring. You won't run into that issue of the initial slowed/stunted growth you were seeing, either. A good tip is that, if there any invasive fish or marine species in nearby water sources (lakes, ponds, etc.) that are hurting the ecosystem, you can go fish those up and till them into the soil (if they're not good for eating or you are unable to eat them). Helps the environment and your garden at the same time. Just make sure to look up/ask the local game warden if you need a license, or if there's a specific method for culling that you need to use
Another trick is if you do want to eat the fish you can fillet them to have the meat on one side and the bones on the other to make stock. Then, once the stock is done you can use whatever is left as fertilizer.
This is my first view on your channel and I am sure there will be many more. I truly loved that you prepared the video over months to show actual results and what people can expect. Great content!
Actual Mayan communities here at the Yucatan peninsula still do this. Ancient Mayan cities even buried their dead fellows at their milpas for religious reasons first, but after noticing results similar to this video, they kept doing it regularly to get better results.
@@phamdinhhoang1998 We use to call ourselves Maya nowadays (not Mayan or Mayans), in a generic way for all our original civilizations. However, before conquistadors we called ourselves Itzá at the northern low lands (where I'm from), Kish at the southern High lands, and few ones at the western highlands, not as Maya as us but very related to us, or us with them, call themselves Winik.
@@doubleheadedeagle6769 I fully agree. You are totally right. However my point was nowadays some Mayan communities still do this. Their dead ones are buried where they will grow a Milpa without any coffin or preparation, only their clothes.
I used to have gardens years ago when I lived in a house, and I always put table scraps or expired food, fish remains after filleting them, even stuff like paper towels too. My gardens grew wonderfully. Good to see your experiment paying off! Thanks for sharing.
I bought a bunch of sardines in water at the Dollar Tree. OMG I had container tomatoes grow up and over my fence....tons of maters! The next year I did it for everything. Oh every thing performed excellently except my hot peppers. My cucumbers grew up a tree. I had to use a ladder to harvest! My green peppers loved the sardines so I have yet to figure out the hot pepper situation. It works! Gonna do it again this coming spring right around morel season. Northern Ohio here so morel season gets me outside!
My grandfather would bury one dead fish in every hole before planting his tomatoes. Every year he had big, juicy tomatoes. He never did anything besides the fish and water.
@@orrgazmo Get a fish swimming in a fishbowl, then plant that in a hole, then put the roots of a pre-started tomato plant into the top of the bowl. You have to support the stem from the sides so it won't flop over. It's fine if the water is a little muddy, especially if you're using a catfish. Come back here a few months later and let us know what happened.
My grandfather use to do the same and his tomatoes were always amazing.He also used to make a liquid fertiliser from left over bits of fish and prawns and seaweed, it smelt awful but he swore by it.
Very good information thanks for creating this video and sharing it, as a kid raised in Maryland my chore was to plant and tend to our garden , dad would have me burry fish heads under many of our vegetable plants so I got to spend my morning caatching fish from our pond then placing the heads in the ground as i planted and for lunch we ate the catch of the day.
This is a good method particularly for providing calcium to the plants. I've always been told to bury about 3 eggs when planting saplings as well and it's yet to fail me on that one ether. Maybe the optimal might be to plant with the fish head, an egg, and then a good dusting of the top soil with ash?
Humans are omnivorous so, humans pretending to be herbivores is the same as going back to stone age - the irony is, back then humans used to eat everything in order to survive. LOL
My parents have always used the remains of the fish we catch during the spring spawning runs here in Wisconsin. Never had a bad season even when the neighbors next door had. My parents knew it works
He said he’s just a backyard planter trying to learn new things good stuff the man just living the best life learning from growing seems like such a peacefulhobby
My dad used to put a hole next to his tomato plant with a pipe then stuck a full mullet into the hole head first and put dirt back over it. Worked amazing
Nice experiment. It makes sense to me. I used to go fishing with my late father and he always made sure to bury the fish heads and entrails in our garden.
I run several aquaponic systems, and about a year and a half ago I lost 25-30 lbs of good sized catfish (12-18" long) due to a pump failure. It was very sad, but I did not hesitate to put their remains to good use. I dug out the center of my cold pile and threw them in the very bottom, and then covered them back up and watered the pile. Within 6-8 months they had completely broken down (with the exception of a couple catfish skulls here and there, those took a while longer to decompose). I had never seen compost that rich in my entire life. It was pure black gold. I ended up using it in an organic hydroponic system as a compost tea and got some of the most insane growth I had ever seen out of my plants. It's truly remarkable how rich in nutrients fish carcasses are, and I would HIGHLY recommend using them in the garden.
Waste not, want not! My Dad used to send me out fishing for bullheads (basically a small type of catfish) specifically so he could chop them up and bury them between the rows in his garden.
@@anunentitledmotivatedmille7731 Different times. They were garbage fish that competed with the bass and perch. Nowadays they do a good job of eating the invasive zebra mussel, and they're still fun to catch, so we toss them back.
Yeah there’s a film, but also science.. the nutrients we or any thing that could fog a mirror,releases on death is amazingly potent for plant/veg growth hence why you can by blood/bone infused soils and fertiliser.
The fish bones are filled with phosphorus. I use sardines they break down quicker. If you use bigger fishes smash the bones as much as possible on average I get 6 extra inches of growth but it is mainly for flowering or fruiting. I would also put some banana peel tea on soil around plants
I have been doing that for years, although not every year and I put 2 full fish on a 4x8 bed & I usually plant like 3 varieties of tomatoes in it. I get to harvest tomatoes & freeze them till spring the following year. Some of my beafsteak tomatoes are as big as my face. Our county in NY has free compost too that we use.
The reason the seedlings above the heads were stunted was due to the ammonia release as the heads started to degrade. This would cause root damage. You need to put the fish heads a foot below the roots of the plant to ensure the plants receive the nitrates coming from the worm castings. Remember, plants don't eat the dead directly (unless they are carnivorous) but instead they absorb nutrients converted via digested organic matter. Once the worms fully have their way with the heads, the plants closest to the area received the most benefits as the worms kept coming back to work on the heads. Cartilage would be the last processed and then the bones would remain.
@@sharpjk - Sadly, most peeps don't drought resist their plants. after a month of growing, I suggest you stop watering your veggies and wait until you start seeing a little wilt. The plants will be forced to grow tap roots which in turn will provide them with more nutrients for when they get to mature fruiting age. Plus, the point is to NOT let the plants grow roots in decaying organic matter as the amount of ammonia is too high. You want the organic matter to be processed by worms and microbes. Don't worry, the nitrates won't stay deep in the soil. Worms need to breath and they come up to the surface at night. They scatter their poop (worm castings) throughout the upper layer of soil. If you keep an inch layer of chipped wood around the base of your plants, the worms will be encouraged to rummage right under that covering thus spreading their nutrients to your veggie roots.
So fish heads 1 ft down & drought resist for tap root growth...what about adding earthworms to the dirt in raised beds? And if so, how would a person know how many to add?
@@creekfinds = Never too many earthworms. They'll leave if they don't have anything to eat, but if you keep enough mulch around your garden, the worms never leave. They just temporarily relocate. Techincally they are ubiquitous (aka EVERYWHERE) and even in my Las Vegas garden I haven't had to buy any additional worms. In other words, if you bury it, they will come.
I think it was actually horseshoe crabs. Lobsters were rare until the 1800s because there were so many cod in the ocean and the cod ate the young lobster.
My husband is a keen fisherman. We used to plant tomatoes in the spot where he had buried the fish frames, but only after waiting a little while. They prefer their fish well aged. But you could definitely tell when they had found them! They went off like rockets!
A lot of plants will grow quicker as a stress reaction to low nutrient availability, in an effort to get to seeding as soon as possible, but they will obviously not be as healthy or nutrient dense as under standard conditions. Maybe that is why the non fish head plants grew quicker but were more yellow..
I think it's more likely that the early stages of decomposition would absorb nutrients from the soil so starve the plants a bit, then as it continues, nutrients would be released back into the soil and become available to the plants.
I was taught the fish head trick when I was a kid. I was always taught that you bury the fish frames, heads etc well before planting your tomatoes. This gives a few months for the fish heads to break down and stabilise the concentration of nutrients. Planting straight away increases risk of burning your plants. It's no different to composting really. I would say the stunted growth in the beginning was due to the fish being too fresh. I always throw prawn shells and fish scraps into my compost.
Idk how youtube knew what I was doing but yeah, I will be buying lots of fishes and place some fish heads underneath my baby plants esp.tomatoes. How accurate the recommendations are. Thank youuuuu for that very essential info, Patience is a must.
right, but people have improved their methods over time and a good compost heap allows things to become less "hot" and reduces the risk of pathogens from fats.
The only fish waste you should bury is the entrails (not the roe, since it is delicious) the bones and skin make great soup/stock material and the head has the best cuts of the fish on it: the cheeks and the collar. If the water where the fish is harvested of substandard quality, i would be more selective about what fish I keep.
@@samsadowitz1724 Good advice. My wife and I, however, don't care much for roe and I find the cheeks too dense for my liking. The collars though are never thrown out and are always grilled via different recipes. As far as the water quality, of course that's just good common sense. Also, I freeze fish in ziplock bags filled with water. I find they keep very well that way even though they take up more freezer space that vacuum sealed. When it's meal time, the water provides great fertilizer.
@@shawnhowell156 Europeans had been farming for 1,000's of years before coming to the America and they knew about using fish and manure as fertilizer before landing the Americas. Squanto MIGHT have taught a bunch of city folk how to use fish as fertilizer but he wouldn't have been teaching farmers anything they already didn't know. In other words it's probably a pop culture myth like the Noble Savage, Manifest Desitiny etc.
Yup, most Natives used fish for natural fertilizer since there weren't domesticated livestock manure until the explorers arrived. Additionally, any large game that was killed would be harvested completely which did not leave anything to use as composted spoiled natural fertilizer. All that was left was fish :)
Not just the southwest, but among most farming tribes especially on the coasts. Europeans used the same technique. Also using every part of the animal including the blood. Indigenous is for all of us, we are all indigenous. Europe, Asia, Africa, Americas, Oceania. Our climates and nature may be different but the way of being close to the earth was all that anyone had "anywhere", it was the only way of existing. Over time, factors and factions have worked to separate people from that connection, some more recent than others. But knowing that everyone came from a connection to earth means we all have a path to get back there.
@@betsyhernandez9996 True, but what about the large herds of non-domesticated Bison. There had to have been lots of available waste piles available for them to use, unless they simply didn't know about grazing animals' manure fertilizing abilities.
We use sardines (in water) buried near the root system (since we live in SW Arizona USA we have to travel too far to go fishing - besides our lakes & rivers are at an all time low). Has done wonders over the years. Also do some kitchen scraps like you do. Thank you - you bring so much necessary info to us for our gardens. Judi
I've heard that the native Americans had a rule that for every stalk of corn you grow you bury one fish. I assume this means fish frames and guts after the meat is eaten. But there is no doubt that the direct high nitrogen output of a decomposing fish would promote growth over one that didn't have that nitrogen rich food at it's roots.
After watching a similar YT video, I planted a couple of hedge plants to replace dead ones. I planted them both on top of tinned sardines (in brine) which I buried in the soil. Both plants are growing really well.
Hi I have just discovered you. This is fantastic info. Would never have thought a fish head would help! I like the way you demonstrate and investigate the remains to see what's actually happened
Regarding the "slow start" with the fish heads: Its important to understand that speed of growth doesn't necessarily indicate better performance. While the fish head plants didn't grow as tall it first, they had greener leaves. This indicates a higher chlorophyll concentration, which was better supported by the nitrogen content of the fish. Because of this, the greener plants were better able to produce food than the no fish head plants, so they didn't have to spend more energy growing taller and could instead put more energy into establishing leaf and flower buds as well as a better root system. This allows the plants to be stronger and more productive in the long run. The no fish head plants had to invest more energy in growing taller in an effort to collect more sunlight. Furthermore, increased flowering and fruiting is supported by phosphorus, which bones are pretty high in and potassium helps grow better roots. Also lots of iron from blood, which supports both photosynthesis and respiration (converting sugars/starches into energy).
One of the reasons that fish waste is used rather than other animals is that fish rots a lot faster, thus releasing nutrients more quickly without causing damage ("fertilizer burn" and bacterial "infection") to the plants. If you had used, say, chicken heads, without composting them first, the nutrients they contain would not be released nearly as quickly and the rotting process would have likely damaged the plant's roots.
Thank you! It's very informative! I knew some of what you wrote about but not all! lol
This more informatively represents exactly what I was thinking. Though in my mind, I was likening the fish-less plants as having more freedom to grow because they lacked the nutrients available in the fish-plants, so they could fulfill biological processes more quickly. More specifically, I'd equate the process along the lines of carrying a nearly empty bucket is easy (fishless plant) but when you have a bucket that is full, it takes more time/energy to carry it (fish-plant). This may not make sense to others, but it works in my brain lol
Would there be any differences between using a saltwater or freshwater fish? Could this method be used to grow cannabis?
This helps thanks. I was wondering if my neighbor would grow good tomatoes and from what you said, I take it I should compost first?
@@jimmyjambon9206 Composting is always best, really, even with fish heads. Fortunately, you can get fishmeal, bone meal, blood meal, etc already composted and ready to mix into your soil, as well as composted manure and regular compost. It takes at least a year to make your own compost, and it has to be turned (mixed up) and watered every month or so during growing season to give good quality. You also should NOT put meat scraps in your compost pile, since it'll attract animals, will stink and can introduce pathogens.
Also, you should also get your soul tested to see what nutrients it needs before deciding which particular amendments to use, such as blood meal for low iron, bone heal for low calcium and phosphorus, etc.
4 am again and this man is answering the questions I never asked myself but I'm still thankful. 😂
Woah your every comment is during 4am
Saaaaame this heals my soul during those late nights 🙏😂
Lmao facts 4:30 am got me watching this
5:12 am (est gang) and I'm here too
Детерминизм это Свобода 🤙
No background music video is best cuz you can hear the nature
N i love it this is the way ofthe future!
Love those bird chirps, squeak, and bug buzz sounds ...
Agreed 💯
Plot twist.
Those nature sounds you heard were actually artificially made so it is still considered as a background music video.
100pie 0eater: I love the sound of a tomato plant growing.
As a chef working professionally, who understands the amount of food wastage we as a society foster, this video makes me very happy. Thank you for sharing!
its not waste is mis used agri product waste is a myth. even urine and feces are fertilizer and have a place in perma culture. waste is a myth
the issue with closed loop zero waste systems is it gives us to much power and out put this is why we are trained to belive there is waste at all; and prevented from using certain wastes or having a certian amount of animals to produce the valuable fertilizer.
@@100canadianmaplestirup8 Are you ok?
@@lol-xc5bz I don't understand what they're saying. Some punctuation would be helpful.
As a former farmer I am still stunned at the waste, produce not selected because it was not "perfect" or (as a cook) noticing the huge amounts left on restaurant plates.
1,000 years later Scientist discover a fish head and assume this whole place was one under water
true
But what about tomato seeds/remains + fertilizers? Were they underwater tomatoes? ;-)))
@@klannstyle nah, those sank along with Titanic in 2012, get your facts straight.
🤣🤣🤣🤣
@@Ariel24K lol
Ha, ha; yes you can fool any died-in-the-wool evolutionist!
Appreciate this man for all the time he spent on making this video.
8 months almost the same time took for a pregnancy
@@fajaradi1223 the video is only 11 minutes.... Idiot
@@evilpimp2475 r/wooosh
@@fajaradi1223 lmao r/whooosh back at you because i was joking get rekt little kid
You take over 8 months to create a full detailed video experiment for us to learn and enjoy. Most people wouldve said the fish head didnt work because it grew slower at the beginning and posted a video earlier. Keep up the amazing posts
The is the good ending to Gladiator where he got to go back home and be a farmer with a youtube channel
Maximus!
Thanos in the opening credits before Thor came down and chopped his head off. He just wanted peace guys lol
hahahahahahaaahahah!!!
I was thinking of watching that movie lol. Guess it means it doesnt have a good ending
@@dynasyss I mean that’s the opening credits of the movie so I’d say that’s the craziest way to start any marvel movie. I’d watch it lol
He's like the Steve Irwin of plants!
Lmao was thinking the same!
more like thge mother teresa of shenanigans
Yup... I agree 😁👏🏼
@Wally Prichard that's kinda low.
Lol yeah
I grew up on a fish farm, when we harvest a crop the garden was fertilized with the byproduct. Consequently we had legendary vegetable gardens.
Reasons I love this channel:
1. The commitment you put into your videos and backyard project
2. The genuine joy and the passion we see in you
3. On point content, less yapping and more on demonstration
4. Dad jokes. Lots of it
Dad jokes best part.
I couldn't say it better Hernandez. "Hey, I'm just a backyard food-gardener hack, who's tryin' to have some fun... ...dig it?" Mark really has no ego, does he? I arrive to spend a few minutes and lose hours here, just learning and laughing.
Hi, Mark. When the Native American Indians used to grow the Three Sisters (corn, beans and squash) together out in the desert, they always buried a fish in the mound where they planted the seeds. People have been doing this for thousands of years. It's proven to work.
when the English first arrived in NAmerica, their crops wouldn't grow in the sandy soil near the shore and many settlers died of starvation. the natives taught them to bury fish in their fields and this one trick allowed the settlers to flourish. the settlers thanked the natives by killing them and stealing their land.
Nope. There is little evidence of fish being used to grow crops prior to European contact. Squanto probably learned to bury fish under the crops while he was in Europe and taught it to the pilgrims and the members of his tribe when he came back.
@@bvbxiong5791 Settlers just practicing the culture the natives have practiced for thousands of years, of genociding eachother and then claiming that land is theirs simply because nobody else who lived there is alive to say otherwise
SO NICE OF YOU TO NOTICE THE 3 SISTERS, IT'S A VERY LOVELY HONEST TRUTH
@@bvbxiong5791 Are you under the impression the Native Americans were just a bunch of Tree-Hugging Gardeners?
Because it is plainly well documented that the majority of these Tribes practiced war, genocide, and enslavement as well... Welcome to the Old World cupcake- everyone did it.
Imagine if the fish memories are somehow transfered to tomatoes, and when you it the tomatoes you saw through the fish perspective, yes I am high.
Wonder if pot plants would benefit equally.
Yeah your high. But... Maybe..... Just imagine bro...
Thats very much believable annnnd im high too. Excuse me but we need someone sober here to confirm this.
@@ericw6202 I am sober (until tomorrow evening) and I can confirm this
Hahahaa...yeah...that'll be creepy
My dog passed away, and we buried her in our backyard, and planted some roses above her grave as a testament to our love for her, and for how much beauty she brought to our lives. The roses grew so well! Recently, a pet chicken died, and I buried her next to the roses and the roses blossomed again. It's about 10 feet tall now.
would you ever try that with consumable food?
Also, r.i.p. to both of them
woulda eaten that chicken ngl
@@Dman6779 Chickens that die of old age don't taste very good. I personally butcher egg hens once they stop laying, and they're really only good for stew.
@@giga4052 chicken
I buried 6 chickens killed by a fox in an area that I now need to plant in. I'm getting the heebie jeebies thinking about digging the area up.
I love when you pause to laugh at your own jokes. You’re such a wholesome garden dad
He looks in pain at every joke he makes. I love it.
Lmao
The root growth was stunted because you created 'hot' compost.
When Native Americans did this, they planted the fish in fall, giving time for decomposition to happen.
Then, they would plant their vegetables in spring.
Thank you for your hard work and observations!
Indeed!
Thanks for reminding me, I forgot about that part. !
Whats hot compost? Jw
@@sasfishadventures9729 compost that hasnt fully decomposed. Usually very high concentrated load of chemicals in a state that pseudo poisons the plant from nutrient overload.
"I'm no scientist."
"For the last couple of decades I've been conducting experiments and that's how I find things out."
You just described what a scientist does. You don't need a fancy degree to do good science, you just need the will and effort to conduct these experiments
That kind of thinking can get you in a camp for Re-education.
🤪😛😜😝
ᛏ
Who is those, them & they in the back?
It's the struggle. Documented in history and secret societies. Pushing ideaoligies that define our future.
INFILTRATING CONQUEST THROUGH MANHANDLING, REQUIRED GUIDANCE , ANTI NATURAL SELECTION, DECISIONS OF EMOTIONS WITH VANITY. FORCED APPEASAL TO SOCIAL JUSTICE AND NEUTRALITY, AND PEACE AT ALL COST ...Including prostrations. While being dependant with emotional safety and diversity for unity as legion.
VERSUS
ALLURING RENAISSANCE, CIVILITY, FREEWILL WITHIN A BALANCE, INGENUITY AND CODE OF CONDUCT. DIFFERENCES BETWEEN PERCEPTIONS WITH A DISTINCTION BETWEEN HUMAN ANIMALS AND BEINGS. PEACE WITH STRENGTH...All parties stand tall. While being independent with compassion to kindred for unity as Tribal.
The struggle is real. The dark consciousness is the real cause. Laugh all you want. But it fits the world view puzzle. All the way back to sumarian tablets. It's like two parents arguing and trying to get the child to choose.
With the dark feeding us things such as WE ARE ONLY HUMAN... WE ARE THE SAME , We are victims and fighting back as a Samaritan is evil and vigilantism. Everyone's voice matters beyond concideration... However, ideas must be approved & requiring leagalnese or a doctorate to be qualified.
BS.
The core thought IS being a distinction between human animals and human beings: CHOOSE.
STILL GRABBING THE BLUE PILL?
RELAX TO THE MOVIE "JOHN CARTER".. Even non-fiction can have insight.
Peer review is missing
@@hoppermantis7615 That was the most incoherent pseudo-intellectual nonsense I've ever seen
@@animalblundetto5673 watch out for Natural Selection....
@@hoppermantis7615 Sure thing. I will keep my eye out for Natural Selection. Thanks.
The reason it is greener, and not necessarily larger is the result of nitrogen released from the fish head. As it decays, the nitrogen is released into the soil and the plant benefits.
Also, it synthesizes sunlite more efficiently and turns a darker green. End rusult, bigger, redder , tomatoes...
"Sunlite" wrong!!!
All you need are beans roots from last year.
Yeah, light green/yellowish leafs are slightly nitrogen deficient. But if the plants were bigger and growing faster then they would require more nitrogen anyway. So if both sets of plants had exactly the same amount of nitrogen but one set grew bigger, then they'd look lighten in colour anyway.
That's great. Do they call you dances with turds in your village?
Russel Crowe looks like he's doing well in retirement.
he sure does!
Well he did say once that dirt cleans off easier than blood. hahaha
Makin movies, making songs, and plantin tahmahtoes
@@Ryanoceros06 oh my what a brilliant episode.
Honestly, I don’t see Russell Crowe. I see Alex Jones
So does this mean a vegan can't eat the tomatoes
🔥😎
Actually tomato plants are kinda carnivorous.....The leaves have tinysharp hairlike structures ....Insects get killed on contact and fall near roots where they are absorbed....
..It's always been
Life feeds on life feeds on life feeds on life.
Unfortunately, the reality of veganism is absolute, denial. Planting vegetables require a lot of animal bi-products to grow efficiently (yes, feathers, bones, fish scrap, manure, that's ALL animal bi-product.) -In the movie The Lion King, where Mufasa explains "When we die, our bodies go in the grass, and the antelope eats the grass. So we are all connected to the great circle of life." Actually has more truth than most people realize. But no, Vegans want to believe they have no relevance to the food chain, so they must think they are gods or fairies or something.
One Only is that a Tool reference? Disgustipated
We make fish fertilizer in Cambodia .it is a great organic one to boost plant
Love your country, my bushcraft skills would be a premium advantage in your land
Some of our (Australia) river systems have been inundated with introduced European Carp for many years. Bounties have been placed on their capture resulting in an industry that processes the Carp into garden products. There are commercial products available at reasonable prices that work very well.
You are number one!!! :)
@Imran nawaz I live on the east coast of USA. The carp in my river tastes like mud... but also has so many tiny bones. Do Pakistani carp have a lot of tiny bones? The catfish are very good here. And bass.
@Imran nawaz... I saw a man who spent a fortune cleaning up his pond... but he showed it was possible. 30 years ago you could see your feet to the bottom of my river from your waist. Now your feet disappear before they are covered. Boats. Farm runoff. Land and forest degradation. Wish I had a time machine. Or could go live in a unknown tribe.
I'm sure the soil you brushed back over looked even more healthy and brown and full of goodness than it started out as - it reminds me of the documentary on the symbiotic relationship between Canadian big forests - salmon - and bears - and how bears catching salmon and munching on them on-land and leaving the bits behind to become fertilizer is an important feature in keeping the forests alive.
An addition to that relationship was discovered in the last few years: wolves too catch salmon but don't eat them at the forest edge the way that bears do: they go roughly 100 metres into the forest to eat their catches. This results in a second band of more vigorous tree growth near the streams.
Lmao. Dumbest thing I've ever heard. Canada has a shit ton of healthy forest where 99.9 percent don't have any bits of salmon left by feeding bears.
Michorrizhae travel nutrients underground to Redwoods away from the water, way inland... I don't know how far, but its astounding! Trees ask for the nutrients and the michorrizhae comply for the sweet sugar the tree provides, and they form chains for miles!
My grandfather always used fish heads in his garden , we would go on a number of fishing trips so he had plenty of heads and a years worth of smoked fish . It always seemed to me as a child his garden was immaculate and produced heavy .
I have been using a whole fish and an egg for about 10 years now with incredible results. When everyone else’s tomatoes are struggling, mine are usually thriving. Thanks for reinforcing my theory!
Explain the egg thing please!
First off, when I said my theory, I certainly didn’t come up with this practice. My grandparents used eggs in the garden and I know if they did, they must have had a good reason. Calcium helps combat blossom end rot and eggs also add much needed nitrogen. It does take quite a while for the eggshells to break down, but when you grow in the same beds year after year I believe it keeps your soil consistent.
@@pauliverson6621 thank you Paul for sharing. Do you just put fish and the whole egg under tomato plant? Is one egg enough?
@@sylvikwiat I'd like to know also please.
Thanks for your comments. I dig the hole at least a foot deep and put the fish and one egg in the bottom, then I take a spade and break them up a bit. One other thing that I have been doing the last couple years is to water with a diluted mix of water and black strap molasses... Seems to make them much sweeter😉
As a recently graduated scientist, I can explain the results found. The intact fish head has lots of nitrogen (N) in it, but it is all plant unavailable (it is solid in the remains). Then organisms start breaking the fish head down, but the microbes doing most of the work require N to grow. So the growing microbes are stealing N from the tomato plant (that's why they were smaller initially). But then the microbe colonies reach a tipping point where they are breaking down more N than they are consuming, so the N becomes plant available and the tomato plant starts benefiting from all that nitrogen.
In the end, just know that a little fertilizer along with your fish head will make it all work out much better.
Nice explanation. Thanks.
I was going to write something similar 😁 I’ve used fish frames and heads for many years and the results on multiple plant types are awesome. I read somewhere many years ago that there is also valuable quantity of P (phosphorus) in fish and seaweed. P (along with K - potassium) is critical for maximum flower and fruit production. So if you plant the fish heads a little deeper under your plants, you’ll reduce the N deficiency early on as root mass is developing, yet all the N, P and most K will become fully available just as the plant matures. Priceless 👍🏼 Another hack...add blood and bone with a sprinkle of lime at the time of planting seedling. This mitagates N loss to microbes and ensures your soil is ‘sweet’ for the best start
@@RuralPlural so i need to murder something to start gardening? 😂
Gifhary Syidhqa Hamim Wanna know some messed up history facts? A lot of lush places use to be battlefields. And yes, nature devouers and the wheel turns. This is why I would like to be buried with no coffin. I would like some type if blu or violet flower on top. I think that would be my last gift from sweat and blood. 🙂
Everything you say is totally 100!
But those BONES are terrific throughout the growing cycle for the roots. Tomatoes relish a continuous supply of something like rock phosphate or bone meal or eggshells for the P in NPK. This ensures that their roots will be strong, the plants will produce plenty of flowers & fruit, & they will be less likely to get blossom end rot.
The no-fish-head tomatoes probably had initial greater access to phosphorus than the others, as he said the soil was good at the start. But the no-fish plants possibly just ran out...that's what it looked like to me.
Obviously the fh plants still had the skulls in the hole, but root hairs and microbes will dissolve bone more slowly than flesh.
Tomatoes don't need that much N in comparison to their love of P. I might plant the head an inch or two below such a small seedling. As you said, a bioactive soil is essential (why they love to sprout in compost piles). No doubt your description of the activities of the soil bacteria interacting first with the head, then with the roots, clarifies much of what occurred on this timeline.
When I was a child my father grew 4 beefsteak tomatoes is the same spot year after year and would put the heads, guts, scales and tails in hole about 18 inches down. It worked every year I can remember.
I wasn't going to grow tomatoes because I moved to a place with no garden...but in one of my containers of soil, a bunch of tomatoes came up...late. Not getting much sun, they aren't growing fast. Thank you for reminding me about the fish! That'll work.
When you wash fish put that water to tomato plant, also produce lots of tomato all year round. We used to have at home.
How do you prevent ants from intruding into the pot to retrieve the small fish parts?
Bug spray
Yes. We do that too in Malaysia. After we clean the fish, we use the water on our plants and bury the entrails of the fish under the plants.
@@Dripthos Non chemical though.
@@mattw337
Why care about ants ? You can drowing them and add them to the soil too 😂
Man I'm impressed that you ran such a long experiment. Good for you and thanks from all of us :)
I love how he makes typical dad jokes that are actually witty that would leave someone with a chuckle
Nadz Plazos Jr read this after one while chuckling when my internet was acting up and loading the video
Yes sir,
I've been putting fish bones, guts, and what's left of a fish filet for years. I concur it works. Been doing it for 17 years. Enjoy your video thanks
I can tell you guys, this is the best YT channel to watch during lockdown. I even started my own container garden a couple of weeks ago with okra, bokchoy, mustard, potatoes, bellpepper and had germinated a squash and watermelon. All of which are doing pretty great in spite of hot weather. Thank you very much Mark for the inspiration.
5:47
As an engineering bachelor's I can say that using scientific methodology for your experiment makes you more of a scientist than 2/3 of academic professors.
why are they allowed to be professors if they dont do things properly?
Or,
TOMATOES ARE USING HUMANS FOR BETTER AND STRONGER FISHES
@@Murtagh653 Nepotism and politics.
Exactly! I am a scientist myself and I found out that what he is doing is better than most of other scientists are doing. No offence to the other scientists, but most of them are doing a lot of experiments which is not practical to the real world. They are concentrating too much on one part and ignored the rest's factors. That is the reason why so many scientists have different results and contradict to one another. They have the brain but do not have the experiences to the real world. I prefer both, academic and practical result as one.
Self sufficient me reminds me of my dad. Chill and doing his best. Love it
This works incredibly well on corn too. The plants last almost twice as long and produce giant corns
When we home kill anything pigs. Poultry etc. We dig a hole and plant a fruit tree on top ... The guts. Feathers. Fur. Innards. Etc.
You mean where the blood was absorbed?
@@fahadus hello there. I meant to say.. we take the guts and innards, feathers or skin, whatever it is that we do not use from the animals burry that and plant a tree on top of it.
I see. Thanks for the clarification!
Stfu
@@scarletpeate and does this work?because i headd that you shoudnt put meat on the earth.or maybe cooked?
Tip: For a bigger farm use whale's head
💐🤣🤣🤣
Well, whales are mammals, try with sharks
@@adityashaw3198 dude... Seriously?? Or you just BAITing us?
@@ryoyprnope, there the TH-camr uses fish, so i recommended a fish, whales aren't fish anatomy wise
@@austinedwardharesco7051 That tip is for giants ..
I’ve added fish carcass to garden beds with great results. I think the fact you used a large fish head might have set you back a bit. The roots would have to grow around it, whereas if you used a carcass, the roots would grow through it and it decomposes better.
G'day Everyone! It has been a big year! I've made more editing blunders in this video than usual (bit tired) but I know you'll forgive me lol... Thanks for your amazing support. BTW, you know I love raised bed gardening and now I'm happy to announce that I've made a deal with Birdies Raised Garden beds in Australia & New Zealand go to birdiesgardenproducts.com.au/ or birdiesgardenproducts.co.nz/ and use Code SSMEbird for a 5% discount. For USA, go here to get Birdies Raised Garden beds: shop.epicgardening.com/ and use SSME2020 for a 5% discount. Cheers :)
I make a fish emulsion from my fish scraps, it's a 5 gallon paint bucket, with fish scraps, water and a tight closing lid. I let it sit and do it's thing for 3 months in the shade, after the last frost and before planting seedlings I use all of the buckets I have done and fertilizer the raised beds.
All of my plants seem to do really well, and they seem to really take off quickly in the spring, I seldom use store bought fertilizers, besides the fish emulsions I do use castings and worm tea on all of the plants through out the summer time and into the fall, during winter when I have my winter crops in I seldom use any additional fertilizers and a seldom water so the roots don't freeze solid.
Thank you for sharing.
Learning a lot from you.
It's Dec '19,...And You have a Merry Christmas and Blessed New Year.
love your stuff man, keep it up!
overseas neighbors happy holidays from 🇳🇱
you are epic my friend!
We went out and caught some albacore and bonito. By the time we got home the bonito was just mush but the albacore was delicious after baking. The bonito went into the ground under the rosebushes. The roses were stunning beautiful that year
Bit late to the party, but I'd like to say you get better results if you till the fish or fish remains into the soil in the fall, letting it decompose over winter. Then you have nice, fertile soil in the spring. You won't run into that issue of the initial slowed/stunted growth you were seeing, either.
A good tip is that, if there any invasive fish or marine species in nearby water sources (lakes, ponds, etc.) that are hurting the ecosystem, you can go fish those up and till them into the soil (if they're not good for eating or you are unable to eat them). Helps the environment and your garden at the same time.
Just make sure to look up/ask the local game warden if you need a license, or if there's a specific method for culling that you need to use
NO ONE ASKED
@@DV-zv4ox angry you are.
@@DV-zv4ox
I asked.
Actually I'm asking rn.
Tomorrow I'll probably ask again.
However, no one asked you if anyone asked.
Another trick is if you do want to eat the fish you can fillet them to have the meat on one side and the bones on the other to make stock. Then, once the stock is done you can use whatever is left as fertilizer.
Thank you. Great idea😊
I've done this before, especially in sandy soil so I can start building up the quality of the soil.
Day 10 of quarantine: What happens when you bury fish heads under tomato plants
You're not in quarantine unless you're sick
Can confirm Turtle, I'm in the middle of a giant city haven't seen the origins of my food in decades lmao
Month 8 of quarantine: let's see what happened to the fish head
Fr 😂😤😭
Booorrrrrinnnnggggg and unoriginal
This is my first view on your channel and I am sure there will be many more. I truly loved that you prepared the video over months to show actual results and what people can expect.
Great content!
Mark - Your channel is quickly becoming my favorite on YT. Cheers...
A few weeks ago, I buried a few Deer heads in between rows of corn. Waiting to see if it makes a difference this year.
The natives "Indians/mayans" of North America used this technique to grow corn and other crops thousands of years ago
Actual Mayan communities here at the Yucatan peninsula still do this. Ancient Mayan cities even buried their dead fellows at their milpas for religious reasons first, but after noticing results similar to this video, they kept doing it regularly to get better results.
this is an interesting concept since ancient American/Mayans were called Indians.
Wow good for them. Hate to break it you but any ancient people that lived near water knew this. Nothing special about it.
@@phamdinhhoang1998 We use to call ourselves Maya nowadays (not Mayan or Mayans), in a generic way for all our original civilizations. However, before conquistadors we called ourselves Itzá at the northern low lands (where I'm from), Kish at the southern High lands, and few ones at the western highlands, not as Maya as us but very related to us, or us with them, call themselves Winik.
@@doubleheadedeagle6769 I fully agree. You are totally right. However my point was nowadays some Mayan communities still do this. Their dead ones are buried where they will grow a Milpa without any coffin or preparation, only their clothes.
*Archeologists in one thousand years find the skeleton*
-There was once a great ocean here!
*Reality*
Man planted fishes head under his tomato.
Nikola Cvorkov hahahaha
Nah man scientists have time machines. That's how they know.
Nikola Cvorkov 😭😭😭
I bury my dead aquarium fish in my garden , and use the tank water as well. ☺
I properly laughed out loud at this comment... on my own XD
I used to have gardens years ago when I lived in a house, and I always put table scraps or expired food, fish remains after filleting them, even stuff like paper towels too. My gardens grew wonderfully. Good to see your experiment paying off! Thanks for sharing.
ChuckRussell87 I tried that and found rats dug them out and eating them. Did you have the same problem? Or didn’t I buried them deep enough?
I bought a bunch of sardines in water at the Dollar Tree. OMG I had container tomatoes grow up and over my fence....tons of maters! The next year I did it for everything. Oh every thing performed excellently except my hot peppers. My cucumbers grew up a tree. I had to use a ladder to harvest! My green peppers loved the sardines so I have yet to figure out the hot pepper situation. It works! Gonna do it again this coming spring right around morel season. Northern Ohio here so morel season gets me outside!
My grandfather would bury one dead fish in every hole before planting his tomatoes. Every year he had big, juicy tomatoes. He never did anything besides the fish and water.
Antenna Wilde would live fish give you the same result or better?
@@orrgazmo Get a fish swimming in a fishbowl, then plant that in a hole, then put the roots of a pre-started tomato plant into the top of the bowl. You have to support the stem from the sides so it won't flop over. It's fine if the water is a little muddy, especially if you're using a catfish. Come back here a few months later and let us know what happened.
@@orrgazmo I mean it should probably be dead before you bury it.
@@JimmyTurner Well Jimmy, if they aren't dead when you bury them, they soon will be. Not to worry. LOL
@theviet BWAA-HAA-HAA Man-go's
My grandfather use to do the same and his tomatoes were always amazing.He also used to make a liquid fertiliser from left over bits of fish and prawns and seaweed, it smelt awful but he swore by it.
Very good information thanks for creating this video and sharing it, as a kid raised in Maryland my chore was to plant and tend to our garden , dad would have me burry fish heads under many of our vegetable plants so I got to spend my morning caatching fish from our pond then placing the heads in the ground as i planted and for lunch we ate the catch of the day.
This is a good method particularly for providing calcium to the plants. I've always been told to bury about 3 eggs when planting saplings as well and it's yet to fail me on that one ether. Maybe the optimal might be to plant with the fish head, an egg, and then a good dusting of the top soil with ash?
A whole egg? Raw or uncooked?
@@p_eople6789 was thinking raw
I liked this. Something to watch during the corona quarantine.
ive started gardening for 2 weeks now, man. A little quarantine production.
I'm banging my neighbor cougsr
lol same here
@@Grizzlybear1914 100% you aren't banging anything.
@@Grizzlybear1914 ur banging one of your hands m8...lol
“Alright! Time to get some actual decent sleep tonight..”
*this video pops up*
“my my my.. what do we have here...”
Yep - every time. Guess we'll have to sleep when we're dead, meanwhile, there's gardening lessons with Mark!
That’s always my problem too.....
Sleep is more important, I just bookmark the video and come back after I get sleep. Way better that way :)
@@MobileAura and that’s how I end up with hundreds in my watch later list!! 😂😂
@@chrissierestall5952 Or thousands 💀 it’s more addictive to bookmark videos/save them than watch them it seems sometimes.
I did that once, I can tell you one thing. I made some cats very happy that day :D
😂😂
I feed TNR ferals and it's hard enough keeping them out of my planter as a litter box nvm if I put fish there lol
Yeah we eat quite a bit of fish in my house. I'm getting a cheap blender just for the fish scraps. Chop it up in little bits and add to some mix
It means even a tomato knows that meat is more nutritious.
take that vegans!
Gaia guided the way. Vegans are just rebels
Humans are omnivorous so, humans pretending to be herbivores is the same as going back to stone age - the irony is, back then humans used to eat everything in order to survive. LOL
@Jack Smith "Life... finds a way"
😆👍
I would be in tomato heaven with a 7 or 8 month grow season .
I picked tomatoes today out of a harbor freight greenhouse, located in Texas along the Arkansas border. They tasted so sweet and good.
My parents have always used the remains of the fish we catch during the spring spawning runs here in Wisconsin. Never had a bad season even when the neighbors next door had. My parents knew it works
Would freezing the fish heads be the ideal way to build up a stock or would it affect it doing its thing ? Asking for a friend.
@Chopper Marc it will work
He said he’s just a backyard planter trying to learn new things good stuff the man just living the best life learning from growing seems like such a peacefulhobby
My dad used to put a hole next to his tomato plant with a pipe then stuck a full mullet into the hole head first and put dirt back over it. Worked amazing
Nice experiment.
It makes sense to me. I used to go fishing with my late father and he always made sure to bury the fish heads and entrails in our garden.
I run several aquaponic systems, and about a year and a half ago I lost 25-30 lbs of good sized catfish (12-18" long) due to a pump failure. It was very sad, but I did not hesitate to put their remains to good use. I dug out the center of my cold pile and threw them in the very bottom, and then covered them back up and watered the pile. Within 6-8 months they had completely broken down (with the exception of a couple catfish skulls here and there, those took a while longer to decompose). I had never seen compost that rich in my entire life. It was pure black gold. I ended up using it in an organic hydroponic system as a compost tea and got some of the most insane growth I had ever seen out of my plants. It's truly remarkable how rich in nutrients fish carcasses are, and I would HIGHLY recommend using them in the garden.
Waste not, want not! My Dad used to send me out fishing for bullheads (basically a small type of catfish) specifically so he could chop them up and bury them between the rows in his garden.
This man is like Steve Irwin of the garden… RIP Steve
I think the same in every video. The Queensland accent and the enthusiasm makes it hard not to.… (I loled hard when he went crikey in this video.)
When I was a kid we used to bury every Sheepshead we pulled out of Lake Erie at the base of a hard maple tree. That thing grew like a rocket.
Wtf
@@anunentitledmotivatedmille7731 Different times. They were garbage fish that competed with the bass and perch. Nowadays they do a good job of eating the invasive zebra mussel, and they're still fun to catch, so we toss them back.
@@Keifsanderson I'm sorry for my short comment. I didn't understand.
@@anunentitledmotivatedmille7731 No worries. Fish just make great fertilizer sometimes.
this is the most wholesome reply section i've ever seen
Let’s build a tomato farm in the cemetery.
everlongs YOOOOOOOO
They already made a movie about it
Yeah there’s a film, but also science.. the nutrients we or any thing that could fog a mirror,releases on death is amazingly potent for plant/veg growth hence why you can by blood/bone infused soils and fertiliser.
We had a guava tree in a parish cemetry it produces the sweetest juuciest biggest guavas
Bodies are in a concrete vault
You’re my favorite TH-cam gardener. Thanks for being genuine and not being a perfectionist!
The fish bones are filled with phosphorus. I use sardines they break down quicker. If you use bigger fishes smash the bones as much as possible on average I get 6 extra inches of growth but it is mainly for flowering or fruiting. I would also put some banana peel tea on soil around plants
I can hear my Thai friend’s mom right now: “Y U No put in soup?!?”
Raaaaaaacist
@@hashslinginhasher u
mad?
@@hashslinginhasher u
@@Dman6779 oh
This is the guy everybody wished were their girlfriend's dad, lbh.
Hahaha....damn, I must be old then, because what was going thru my head was....”I wonder if he’s married or single”!!🥰
😂
He's definitely a John Wick kinda guy, a 'one woman' gentleman
Hot daddy hehe
@@youtubereact_v1 shouldn't we all try to live like that?
At 5:50 Thank you! This is excellent work! The growing and the filming and the experiment!
I have been doing that for years, although not every year and I put 2 full fish on a 4x8 bed & I usually plant like 3 varieties of tomatoes in it. I get to harvest tomatoes & freeze them till spring the following year. Some of my beafsteak tomatoes are as big as my face. Our county in NY has free compost too that we use.
I'll be heading off down to the local cemetery and plant a few tomato seedlings this weekend, i'll let you know how it goes in a couple of months
The reason the seedlings above the heads were stunted was due to the ammonia release as the heads started to degrade. This would cause root damage. You need to put the fish heads a foot below the roots of the plant to ensure the plants receive the nitrates coming from the worm castings. Remember, plants don't eat the dead directly (unless they are carnivorous) but instead they absorb nutrients converted via digested organic matter. Once the worms fully have their way with the heads, the plants closest to the area received the most benefits as the worms kept coming back to work on the heads. Cartilage would be the last processed and then the bones would remain.
would tomato plant roots be able to reach a foot below? also would it more efficient to use fish emulsion once a week?
@@sharpjk - Sadly, most peeps don't drought resist their plants. after a month of growing, I suggest you stop watering your veggies and wait until you start seeing a little wilt. The plants will be forced to grow tap roots which in turn will provide them with more nutrients for when they get to mature fruiting age. Plus, the point is to NOT let the plants grow roots in decaying organic matter as the amount of ammonia is too high. You want the organic matter to be processed by worms and microbes. Don't worry, the nitrates won't stay deep in the soil. Worms need to breath and they come up to the surface at night. They scatter their poop (worm castings) throughout the upper layer of soil. If you keep an inch layer of chipped wood around the base of your plants, the worms will be encouraged to rummage right under that covering thus spreading their nutrients to your veggie roots.
So fish heads 1 ft down & drought resist for tap root growth...what about adding earthworms to the dirt in raised beds? And if so, how would a person know how many to add?
@@creekfinds = Never too many earthworms. They'll leave if they don't have anything to eat, but if you keep enough mulch around your garden, the worms never leave. They just temporarily relocate. Techincally they are ubiquitous (aka EVERYWHERE) and even in my Las Vegas garden I haven't had to buy any additional worms. In other words, if you bury it, they will come.
@@cjandauntieyaya1446 Great, thank you!
When the pilgrims first came, lobsters were so plenty that native Americans used to bury those as fertilizer.
pilgrims heads or lobsters heads?
@@rodney73991 both
and the were fed to prisoners as they were thought to be the same as rats, just like a sea version, they weren't always considered a delicacy
And turkeys were so big that, people used them to ride around the thick jungles.
I think it was actually horseshoe crabs. Lobsters were rare until the 1800s because there were so many cod in the ocean and the cod ate the young lobster.
Sooo this is a gem of a channel. Much love from America mate !!!!!!! He’s amazing
My husband is a keen fisherman. We used to plant tomatoes in the spot where he had buried the fish frames, but only after waiting a little while. They prefer their fish well aged. But you could definitely tell when they had found them! They went off like rockets!
A lot of plants will grow quicker as a stress reaction to low nutrient availability, in an effort to get to seeding as soon as possible, but they will obviously not be as healthy or nutrient dense as under standard conditions. Maybe that is why the non fish head plants grew quicker but were more yellow..
I think he means "people."
Interesting!
I think it's more likely that the early stages of decomposition would absorb nutrients from the soil so starve the plants a bit, then as it continues, nutrients would be released back into the soil and become available to the plants.
Insightful comment thank you
I was taught the fish head trick when I was a kid. I was always taught that you bury the fish frames, heads etc well before planting your tomatoes. This gives a few months for the fish heads to break down and stabilise the concentration of nutrients. Planting straight away increases risk of burning your plants. It's no different to composting really. I would say the stunted growth in the beginning was due to the fish being too fresh.
I always throw prawn shells and fish scraps into my compost.
Idk how youtube knew what I was doing but yeah, I will be buying lots of fishes and place some fish heads underneath my baby plants esp.tomatoes. How accurate the recommendations are. Thank youuuuu for that very essential info, Patience is a must.
My son fishes a lot, my entire garden has fish heads in it now. I let him and my husband do that part. Happy gardening!
Burying the head and guts around the garden is exactly what old timers did.
I still do it, it works on all garden veggies. Lucky for me I have a pond stocked with fish on my property.
right, but people have improved their methods over time and a good compost heap allows things to become less "hot" and reduces the risk of pathogens from fats.
A native tradition
@@kingjames4886 could you explain more for someone who doesn't know anything about gardening
@@user-ez9is7lb9p you mean all vegetables ?
organic fertilizer is made from dung/feces ~
As an avid fisherman I have been burying my fish waste in my gardens for years and those gardens are doing swimmingly well.
Smart man
Actually the water we wash the fish is also great manure.
The only fish waste you should bury is the entrails (not the roe, since it is delicious) the bones and skin make great soup/stock material and the head has the best cuts of the fish on it: the cheeks and the collar.
If the water where the fish is harvested of substandard quality, i would be more selective about what fish I keep.
@@samsadowitz1724
Good advice. My wife and I, however, don't care much for roe and I find the cheeks too dense for my liking. The collars though are never thrown out and are always grilled via different recipes. As far as the water quality, of course that's just good common sense. Also, I freeze fish in ziplock bags filled with water. I find they keep very well that way even though they take up more freezer space that vacuum sealed. When it's meal time, the water provides great fertilizer.
@@jerrywright7250 i did that a lot in culinary school, so i always like to use everything before discarding the rest.
I LOVE how he just pokes his finger through the fish eyeballs without any sign of being creeped out!🤣
Cuz hes not a little girl
@@RobertELee420 gtfo, when I was a little girl, I love the popping the eyes and nobody could eat the “cheeks“ Of the fish if I was at the dinner table
I tried same thing burying my neighbor.
Let me guess: your tomato plants grew human eyeballs....
Im calling police right now
Wtf dude
Now your neighbor is a part of "you"
So that’s basically a win-win situation, except for your neighbor lamo
Me: reads title
Also me: “Well I don’t know why you would do this, but you have my curiosity”
Ancients /Indians did it for fertilizer..probably noticed things grew better on their food waste/ trash or near rivers where they cleaned fish..
@@delljohnson172 haha was about to comment the same thing, but I was going to mention the ancient native Americans
I had a neighbor who would do this for his cannabis plants he had 18 footers every year!
Give me his info...
For gardening tips of course
@@paulsaprans8798 that guy went to prison like 15 years ago cops found real drugs at his house!
I love the use of exclamation marks here. Very wholesome
@@brunosinga I don't need periods that's a woman's thing!
@@jonmacdonald5345 spoken like a true patriot, Godspeed!
What a good idea to bury kitchen scraps in the garden.
Thanks Mark
Me : right... imma go to slee-
Yt reccomendation : what do you think?
Me: ...go on...
tomahto tomayto
Same 😅
happens every time
One of the oldest and still the best fertilising techniques.... Great to see it in action!
You're absolutely right! The Native American Indians taught this the the colonists to get the best results from growing crops!
@@shawnhowell156 Europeans had been farming for 1,000's of years before coming to the America and they knew about using fish and manure as fertilizer before landing the Americas. Squanto MIGHT have taught a bunch of city folk how to use fish as fertilizer but he wouldn't have been teaching farmers anything they already didn't know. In other words it's probably a pop culture myth like the Noble Savage, Manifest Desitiny etc.
Hoehner Tim p
@@readhistory2023 Well said.
@@readhistory2023 any proof of farming with fish before coming to the Americas? Had a school project on this topic and could prove nothing
Native Americans in the South West US were known to drop a small fish in when planting corn.
Yup, most Natives used fish for natural fertilizer since there weren't domesticated livestock manure until the explorers arrived. Additionally, any large game that was killed would be harvested completely which did not leave anything to use as composted spoiled natural fertilizer. All that was left was fish :)
Not just the southwest, but among most farming tribes especially on the coasts. Europeans used the same technique. Also using every part of the animal including the blood. Indigenous is for all of us, we are all indigenous. Europe, Asia, Africa, Americas, Oceania.
Our climates and nature may be different but the way of being close to the earth was all that anyone had "anywhere", it was the only way of existing. Over time, factors and factions have worked to separate people from that connection, some more recent than others.
But knowing that everyone came from a connection to earth means we all have a path to get back there.
fish heads or a dead starfish etc. all work temendously well. Isobel, a Skidegate BC Haida Nation elder woman taught me this
@@betsyhernandez9996 True, but what about the large herds of non-domesticated Bison. There had to have been lots of available waste piles available for them to use, unless they simply didn't know about grazing animals' manure fertilizing abilities.
We use sardines (in water) buried near the root system (since we live in SW Arizona USA we have to travel too far to go fishing - besides our lakes & rivers are at an all time low). Has done wonders over the years. Also do some kitchen scraps like you do. Thank you - you bring so much necessary info to us for our gardens. Judi
My grandfather did this when I was a kid. I was wondering why we weren’t eating the fish. He told me it helps the garden and he was right.
I've heard that the native Americans had a rule that for every stalk of corn you grow you bury one fish. I assume this means fish frames and guts after the meat is eaten. But there is no doubt that the direct high nitrogen output of a decomposing fish would promote growth over one that didn't have that nitrogen rich food at it's roots.
Makes you wonder if you could pull a bushel from one stalk...
@@stickshaker101 No, no it does not.
On this side of the pond us USA people heard how natives taught the Europeans to place a fish in with the plantings to improve growth.
After watching a similar YT video, I planted a couple of hedge plants to replace dead ones. I planted them both on top of tinned sardines (in brine) which I buried in the soil. Both plants are growing really well.
Hi I have just discovered you. This is fantastic info. Would never have thought a fish head would help! I like the way you demonstrate and investigate the remains to see what's actually happened