I never buried them in the garden - at least not on purpose. ;) If I tried it here the raccoons would surely till the entire garden up for me. But I do add all the scraps to my compost pile on a regular basis. Works quite well that way.

I too have read the American Indian story of burying the fish when they planted corn. It can't hurt and it is bound to help the plants but you can accomplish the same thing by composting them and avoid all the deep digging. :^)

Have never done it, but I am a catch and release kind of guy ;-)

Seems like a time tested tradition though.

I have a compost pile, but to tell the truth I have always questioned the value. The nutrients in the raw material I would rather have where the plants grow than under the pile.

I think the idea of burying some compostables when planting might make some sense.

I could SWEAR that I read that they buried the fish a couple years before they used that particular spot... but I know I read this before the web was invented, so I have no way to verify it.

We bury fish. It's an excellent source of nitrogen.

I don't normally bury the whole fish.

Just the scales, heads, insides etc left over after cleaning them. I bury the newspaper that I clean them on as well.

I have composted that stuff a time or two but much prefer to just bury it in the ground so that I don't have to deal with it ever again.

If you garden in rows you could bury the fish etc in the paths and then use those areas as rows next season.

Thanks,
That was pretty much what I expected.
Getting confident my garden is going to turn around

If you bury the bones it will add calcium too, correct? Over time, I mean.

Small, very small, amounts of calcium.

It's a great way to attract raccoons to your garden... but tomatoes LOVE it. I wish I could do it again this year but..

Pete, I've been waiting for someone to ask that question. The answer is a solid YES. It's one of the best fertilizers I've ever used. You were right to bury a foot down, that's below the smell zone. ;-) By the time the roots find the fish it'll be well on it's way and will provide amazing growth. Try it under any plant and you'll see amazing results. Just don't tell anybody you're doing it, some counties forbid it. I know, I know, why? I don't know any good reason why, they just do. Like taxes.

If it helps any, while I worked at the cranberry experiment station we were developing a fertilizer made from fish parts discarded from the fish plants. So yeah, a great idea.

By the way Alaskan Fish Fertilizer, and other fish fertilizers, are made from fish.

If the animals are already around your place they might find the fish, but if they're not they won't - at least that's been our experience. One year when there was a fox around he dug up fish buried a foot deep. And kept digging every night even when all that was left was the smell. No foxes around since, and I've had no trouble.

This spring I dug a trench about 10" deep in a fifty foot row and laid in it some thawed last year's mackeral fillets from the freezer - about 50 of them - covered with a foot of soil and mulch. A month later they haven't been disturbed, and one of these days I'll transplant greens into it.

Yeah, the one thing about burying the fish versus using it as a liquid fertilizer is you DO avoid that wonderful wafting odor! :D

I used to have a 55 gal aquarium that got cleaned about once a year usually in the spring or early summer. We would stir up the rocks in the bottom and just suck up as much of the cloudy water as we could. I would always move the water hose from one tomato plant to the other giving them all a little taste of the dirty fish tank water. They always loved it. So yes, anything to do with fish would be good.

Buried fish remains in our compost pile - our dog got into it and rolled around in that mess - thought we'd never get rid of the smell

The best way to bury fish is with a post hole digger.

I am also an avid fisherman and often bury fish in my garden, usually only 5"-6" deep and I have never had a problem with anything digging it up. It is usually completely broken down in only a few weeks, and is a great fertilizer.

Ron
The Garden Guy
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Why bury fish when you can eat it? Just saying...

I bury what remains after I c;ean or filet them, not good edible fish. Sometimes i may bring home a few "garbage fish", that are not usually edible, for fertilizer - like sea robins for instance!! :-)

Ron
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I guess I'm even more of a cheapskate...I use the leftover bones and head after I clean them and make soup out of it. The only thing I really "trash" are the guts, but I rarely get fish that fresh

Hi. I just have to add a word of warning. Please bury deeply. Years ago, a neighbor died from stepping on a buried fish bone while working in her garden. (I was told from tetanus) Now I know that we all have had our "shots" and don't garden barefoot, nevertheless, Smile, I needed to share it with you.
Sudzy

is shark meat ok to use in garden

jon60647 my guess would be since it's a fish yup. I don't see why not. My only obstacle to burying fish in the garden is the wife. She would have a fit if she saw me do it. So I have to sneak around in the late night or early AM. Hehehe...