Posts by Joel Simmons
Simple, Powerful Programs for Success
Whether you’re preparing for aerification or enhancing your soil’s microbial activity, our specialized products are designed to help your turf flourish. From tees to greens, these trusted solutions deliver the support your turf needs to thrive. Myco Replenish & Renovate Plus Aerification Program for Growth and Recovery Perfect for enhancing recovery after aerification, these products…
Read MoreHow to Fight Off Plant Stress Factors
EarthWorks has the solution to recover from this dry, hot summer weather. This month we’re highlighting our most popular go-to products: Sea3 and 5-4-5. This pairing is the perfect solution to help your plants and soil withstand the most stressful months. Recovery from Summer Stress … Sea3 Powered by BioCharge Sea3 consists of a complex formula that helps mobilize the maximum…
Read MoreAerification and Construction
Aerifying in the spring allows oxygen, the most important nutrient in all of turf management, to get deep into the root zone. This is the best time to provide sustainable minerals to the plant allowing them to feed all year long. By adding carbon, you can stimulate microbiology. The growing season is the time the plant takes out as many nutrients from…
Read MoreSea3 – The most complete carbon based product on the market
Did you know that ocean water is the perfect fertilizer? Find the importance in using the power of seawater to grow more resilient plants this summer. Dive in and learn all about Sea3! Sea3 is a unique carbon-based liquid soil amendment formulated from three distinctive sea based nutrient sources: fish meal, kelp meal, and sea…
Read MoreSpring up with EarthWorks Foliars+ powered by BioCharge
The EarthWorks Foliars+ liquid line was formulated to mimic nature by one of the most respected experts in the field of sustainable agriculture and foliar and soil nutrition – Jerry Brunetti. It took years of research and formulation trials to achieve the level of success we have today. This is why three of our products…
Read MoreMr. Bear the Giving Bus Driver! An opportunity to help one of our own.
It may surprise you that Fellow Turf Head, and friend of EarthWorks, Dave “Mr. Bear” Wilber has an additional part time job as a school bus driver. The vocation was born out of Dave’s need for health insurance. What Dave never could have predicted was that it would turn into a community outreach program for…
Read MoreHarsh Soil Environments – Humic Substances are the Perfect Buffer
Do you know what a humic acid is? Chemically it is not an acid at all, we refer to them as humic substances. The Humic Product Trade Association (HPTA) is an organization of scientists dedicated to protecting consumers by qualifying their members’ claims when using humic substances in a fertility product. EarthWorks has been a proud member of the HPTA since…
Read MoreConcentrations of Flow
There is always something new to learn in the turf industry. Listening to the EarthWorks Podcast with Dennis Hurley and Zach Boudreaux from Turf Drainage of America will give everyone the opportunity to learn new things about how water moves through a soil. Dennis details the concept of concentrations of flow in a fairway environment and helps us all understand the importance of knowing…
Read MoreGrow Roots Now! Apply this key nutrient in the fall
The leaves are starting to turn colors! Just like the squirrel gathering acorns, growers are preparing their plants for winter. The key question: How can I prepare the plants for winter both economically and agronomically? The answer of course: Grow a deep and strong root system that will sustain the plant throughout its all-consuming push…
Read MoreTalking Carbon Since 1988
Carbon has become the most overused word in the turf industry. It is hard to have a meeting with any fertilizer salesperson without hearing about carbon. But does the industry really understand why we use carbon in turf management programs, and are all carbon sources the same? We use carbon-based fertilizers for one sole reason…
Read MoreEarth Day 2022
Here’s hoping that everyone has some beautiful spring sunshine today on Earth Day 2022. What a joy it would be for all to witness, in person, the miracle that is responsible for all life on earth: Photosynthesis. It is the life-giving marriage of our celestial energy provider, the sun, with the terrestrial nectar that is…
Read MoreEarth Day 2021
We’re back at it again and we’re asking you to consider something that is so commonplace we think about it every day. It’s really what we think about all the time – it’s growing plants! When we look at it from a slightly different angle, we believe it can add enormous significance to our work!…
Read MoreThe EarthWorks Protective Mask Project
One of the very first business partners that I met when EarthWorks was established in the late 1980’s was our longtime friend and printer Fran Pinter from American Printing in Easton Pennsylvania. Since the beginning of EarthWorks Fran has printed every stitch of marketing material, office letter head and our client favorite – the EW…
Read MoreWe are all in this together
Covid-19 Update from Joel Simmons To our valued Distributor Partners and Clients, As we see the world as we know it change moment by moment, we at EarthWorks want to assure you that we are committed to doing everything within our power to continue delivering our products and services without interruption. There will be things…
Read MoreGray Leaf Spot and EarthWorks
This past year was a notoriously bad Gray Leaf Spot year in most parts of my territory on the eastern third of the country. I recently met w/ Dave Lawson at the MATE show in Fredericksburg VA. Dave is a long time steward of Biological Soil Management. As he says, “in 20 years of sales,…
Read MoreChat with Brandon Perrine at Deerwood Country Club
I recently had a chat with Brandon Perrine at Deerwood Country Club in South Jersey. His story is cool, and one that anyone who is into EarthWorks and what we do would find interesting: About half way through our conversation Brandon exclaimed, “I tell people I use EarthWorks and they say, ‘that’s the soil spray…
Read MorePatience is a virtue
It’s extremely rewarding to be a part of an agronomic success story at a golf course from the start. I’ve had the good fortune to experience it first hand at two different courses as a superintendent, and have followed another one right down the road from me. Jerimiah Farmer, golf course superintendent at the venerable…
Read MoreBiological Soil Management
Please take a look through our “White Papers” section where we recently published a paper entitled “Biological Soil Management Puts The Soil To Work For You.” This paper is an overview of the work that we have been dedicated to for the past thirty years. This work has helped so many clients and friends cut their days…
Read MoreBioavailability of Nutrients
In January of 1988, Jerry Brunetti and I founded EarthWorks. For 30 years we have built carbon-based fertility products and helped superintendents use soil testing data to make positive changes to their properties. From the day our company started we have felt a very deep respect for the work done by soil managers. We have…
Read MoreSoil First Foliars
At EarthWorks, we believe that the health of the soil is imperative in producing quality turf and by promoting the health of the soil, we can reduce inputs. Since the conception of EarthWorks in 1988, we’ve believed that both granular and liquid products are important tools to build a good carbon profile in the soil.…
Read MoreSand and Nutrient Mobility
Last year, EarthWorks consulted on over 12,000 soil tests from all across the country, something we have been doing for many years now. When one sees this much soil data, trends appear. We see how things change and how they impact the success of the people we have so much respect for. Over the many…
Read MoreThink Dynamically
This is a story that I tell often… because it perfectly depicts how EarthWorks was built, why we do what we do, and the type of relationship Jerry Brunetti and I had from the birth of our company in the late 1980’s. To preface, from the beginning Jerry had a clear vision of why we…
Read MoreRemembering Jerry Brunetti
It is with a very heavy heart that I write of the passing of our co-founder Jerry Brunetti. He was my mentor, my business partner of 26 years, my friend but most importantly Jerry Brunetti was my inspiration. Jerry was one of the most unique and brilliant minds of our time. He formulated most of…
Read MoreTeam EarthWorks is Published!
I am so proud to announce that we are published with not one but two new books available from Team EarthWorks.
Read MoreEarthWorks Replenish 3-4-3 is OMRI Certified
EarthWorks is proud to announce that its Replenish 343 is OMRI certified. The Organic Materials Review Institute is a leader in organic standards and compliance. EarthWorks has always been a leader in organic fertilizer and is excited to be certified with the nations leader in organic standardization.
Read MoreMyco-Replenish now available in Greens Grade, 50# bags
Earth Works is pleased to announce that Myco-Replenish 3-3-3 Organic Fertilizer with Mycorrhizae is now available in a Greens Grade formulation, as well as in convenient 50-pound bags. Myco-Replenish combines the high quality of EarthWorks Replenish natural organic fertilizers with root stimulating endo and ecto mycorrhizae fungi.
Read MoreBrooklyn Bridge Park… Spectacular!
Every once in a while a very cool project comes along that’s a little out of the norm. The work going on at the Brooklyn Bridge Park is one of those, and it is spectacular! A few weeks ago I made contact with an old friend of EarthWorks, former golf course superintendent Paul Sutter, who…
Read MoreEveryone is an “Organic Guy”!
I was recently invited to speak at a distributors’ meeting taking place at a golf course. As I waited for my turn to speak, I asked the distributor if our host superintendent was using EarthWorks products. He responded “No, he’s not an organic guy”!!! Not an organic guy, I thought – and it really hit…
Read MoreFall is for Feeding … The Soil.
Just as I’m about ready to get back into the pool… Summer is over! In the turf business, fall has got to be everyone’s favorite season; it means we survived yet another tough summer. I travel, a lot, and I see a lot of golf courses and a lot of athletic fields all over the…
Read MoreA few delinquent words on the US Open… and damn, it’s hot out there!!!
The Open was an incredible experience that I will remember a lifetime and I have to thank Pat Finlen for that. Pat is a class act and did a hell of a job on the biggest stage in golf and I say that not because of the EW that he uses (but of course that helps!) but because…
Read MoreHelp Me Understand Something…
The other day a former student, an experienced superintendent and friend sent me an exasperated email that diagrammed his annual “expert” consultation meeting. It sounded like this: “Good afternoon. I just wanted to drop you a quick line. I have made a few observations this year that I would like to share. First, using Logan Labs tests and the…
Read MoreOK, I’m Done! No More “He Said/She Said” Articles for Me.
Twenty four years ago Jerry Brunetti and I were finalizing our business plan for a new company that we decided to call EarthWorks. I had spent five years at Penn State as a horticulture student and five years as a Penn State County Extension Agent. Jerry had already established a business in the sustainable agriculture…
Read MoreA very tough growing year…
One very tough growing year for a lot of sections of the country which followed what I thought was one of the toughest weather years on record. I won’t be making that statement again after the year we just went through. Have you seen the flood pictures from Vermont? Did you see the pictures of…
Read MoreWOW! What year is it?
Wait, when did they invent the internet??? I feel like I’ve been taking a 15 year cyber nap!!! OK, the EW website hasn’t been updated for a while but I promise we will keep this one at least in the twentieth century! Many thanks to my friend Peter McCormick of TurfNet fame who had to…
Read More