fertilizer

/ˌfʌrdlˈaɪzər/

/fətɪˈlaɪzə/

Other forms: fertilizers

Material you add to a garden to increase the nutrients in the soil and help plants grow is called fertilizer. If your rosebushes are looking a little sad, you might want to try using fertilizer.

To fertilize is to make something fertile, or to encourage it to grow or reproduce. These words, along with fertilizer, come from the Latin fertilis, "bearing in abundance, fruitful, or productive." The most common kind of organic fertilizer is animal manure or peat, and other fertilizers are made of specific nutrients like nitrogen or potassium. Fertilizers are usually solid, though they come in liquid form as well.

Definitions of fertilizer

1. noun

   any substance such as manure or a mixture of nitrates used to make soil more fertile
   synonyms: fertiliser, plant food

   types:

   organic, organic fertiliser, organic fertilizer

   a fertilizer that is derived from animal or vegetable matter

   bonemeal

   fertilizer made of ground bones

   neem cake

   residue after oil is pressed from neem seeds

   manure

   any animal or plant material used to fertilize land especially animal excreta usually with litter material

   fish meal

   ground dried fish used as fertilizer and as feed for domestic livestock

   guano

   the excrement of sea birds or bats; used as fertilizer

   type of:

   chemical, chemical substance

   material produced by or used in a reaction involving changes in atoms or molecules