Fertilize with Urine
Since founding the Institute, we have heard countless stories from people using urine in home gardens, often with spectacular results. Though they may not realize it, they are continuing an ancient practice, as there is a long history of recycling of human urine as fertilizer. In recent years, home urine reuse has taken new relevance as a way to promote water quality and protect lakes and rivers from nutrient pollution.
The Rich Earth Institute’s ‘Urine My Garden’ education program teaches gardeners how to safely and effectively fertilize crops with urine. By peecycling, you can grow a more abundant garden harvest, protect your watershed, and conserve clean water otherwise used for flushing! Sign up for our gardener mailing list to hear updates on this program and stay connected (select the ‘gardening checkbox in the newsletter form).
Urine My Garden!
Guide
Webinars
Portable Peecycler
Survey & Zine Submission
Urine My Garden: Guide to Using Urine Fertilizer for Home Gardens
Check out our step-by-step guide to safely and effectively fertilizing with urine in your home garden. Email us at with any additional questions!
A great source of guidance for francophones who wish to use urine in their home gardens is L’Urine, de l’or liquide au jardin by Renaud de Looze. Carol Steinfeld’s book, Liquid Gold, the Lore and Logic of Using Urine to Grow Plants also includes a history of various uses for urine.
‘Urine My Garden’ Webinars
This webinar covers why & how to fertilize your garden with urine. Reclaiming urine as a fertilizer is a safe and simple practice that gardeners everywhere can learn to access an abundance of free fertilizer – and prevent downstream pollution! View upcoming dates on our events page and a short version of this presentation on YouTube.
Are you an organization that is interested in hosting a ‘Urine My Garden’ webinar? We would love to partner with you! Email to get in touch.
Portable Peecycler
Learn more and purchase here. The peecycler is a urine fertilizer collector designed and handmade by the Rich Earth Institute in Brattleboro, VT. These watertight containers are easy to use for collecting and transporting to one of our Vermont urine depots or to your garden!
You can also DIY a urine collector with our short instructional video.
Survey
Do you already fertilize your garden with urine? We want to hear about it! Share your experiences with the art, science, and practice of fertilizing with urine. Complete our Urine My Garden Survey to help grow the body of knowledge about where, how, and why people fertilize with urine in their home gardens around the world. View our 2024 survey overview presentation (‘Urine My Data’) here to see some of the results.
Log Sheet
Download and print this log sheet to track your urine fertilization and observations throughout the season. Then use the log to complete our survey at the end of the growing season. Scan or take a photo of your log sheet to submit when prompted in the survey.
Call for Zine Submissions!
We are creating a zine for home gardeners, compiling voices and perspectives from peecycling gardeners around the world. Share your tips & tricks, art, stories, or memories about fertilizing with urine! Complete this form to submit a contribution to our zine.
