# Methylene Urea question



## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

Is the water soluble component of methylene urea essentially just fast release urea? I'm looking at the label for Lebanon 100% Meth-Ex 40-0-0 fertilizer and I see that the methylene urea has a water soluble component in the amount of 21.0%. Does that portion act exactly the same as regular urea, or is it tied up in the molecule somehow, and thus acts as slow release?

Another way to ask this: what percent of methylene urea is actually slow release N? All of it? Or only some?

Extension.psu has some numbers: https://extension.psu.edu/turfgrass-fertilization-a-basic-guide-for-professional-turfgrass-managers

However, I'm not sure how these percentages are listed. What does "Percentage water-insoluble nitrogen* of the total nitrogen*" mean? For example for Meth-Ex 40-0-0, they list _31.3% WIN_ in one column, but "_52.5% _slowly available water-soluble nitrogen" in the next. I don't understand what portion of the 40% these numbers represent. Does this mean almost half of it is really fast release N?

Another interesting, if vague quote:
_
"Ureaform is made by reacting urea with formaldehyde in ratios of about 1.3 to 1. Ureaform fertilizers should contain at least 35 percent nitrogen, with at least 60 percent of the total nitrogen being WIN. Urea-formaldehyde products not falling within these guidelines are referred to by other terms such as methylene urea and methylol urea."_

So, methylene urea varies?

Also, in ureaform, like Lebanon U-Form 38-0-0, part of the methylene urea is classified as water soluble. Is this cold or hot water soluble? Because if hot, it apparently requires microbial breakdown, and is therefore slowly available as I understand it.

According to groundsmag: "_The unreacted (and, therefore, quick-release) urea N content in UF is usually less than 15 percent of the total N_."
http://www.grounds-mag.com/mag/grounds_maintenance_food_turf_slowrelease/


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## Greendoc (Mar 24, 2018)

Methylene Urea is made in many different grades. From liquid Methylene Urea that is 28-0-0 and has up to 50% of that as slow release, the rest being non polymerized Urea that is immediately available, to the highly polymerized Urea that is a solid. The latter may be 100% slow release. Looking at the supplied labeling, there is 6.5% N in the form of unreacted Urea. The rest is polymerized to varying degrees.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

Greendoc said:


> Methylene Urea is made in many different grades. From liquid Methylene Urea that is 28-0-0 and has up to 50% of that as slow release, the rest being non polymerized Urea that is immediately available, to the highly polymerized Urea that is a solid. The latter may be 100% slow release. Looking at the supplied labeling, there is 6.5% N in the form of unreacted Urea. The rest is polymerized to varying degrees.


Ok. I think what I'm really looking for is Ureaform, and maybe some "methyleneurea" as well to blend into it. Hopefully someone has pure ureaform available around here in granular form. Not sure how popular the pure forms are on the market. If I can find that Lebanon U-Form 38 and Meth-Ex 40 at a good price locally, I'll be happy. Looking forward to experimenting more with it, outside of the blends sold under Lebanon and Scotts brands.


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## Greendoc (Mar 24, 2018)

Not very popular. Ureaform is very slow release. As in no activity for the first month after application. What are you trying to do with these slow release formulations? I have seen them in hydroseed applications or else for soil injections for trees . Not so much on maintained turf


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

Greendoc said:


> Not very popular. Ureaform is very slow release. As in no activity for the first month after application.


Sounds good to me. I'd blend it with Methylene urea to get a little fast release in there.

Planning to experiment with slow release alternatives to spoonfeeding in Fall, when organics or PCU aren't as useful.


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## Greendoc (Mar 24, 2018)

Those are also organics that need microbial activity to release. I am not a fan of anything slow release when it is possible to spoon feed. Granules not staying where they are placed are a concern of mine


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

Greendoc said:


> Those are also organics that need microbial activity to release. I am not a fan of anything slow release when it is possible to spoon feed. Granules not staying where they are placed are a concern of mine


Yeah, I use Protein Hydrolysate in Spring, but it's not so useful in cooler weather here in Fall. We have a whole discussion going about eliminating the final winterizing app we normally do around here, and methylene ureas have given me excellent Fall response, but I've only used them in Scotts and Lebanon blends. They don't include enough for it to be a true alternative to spoonfeeding.

I'm ok with the prills, because of high cut turf. I attended a funeral back in April, when the grass was just greening up around here. The church lawn had been cut at least once and looked awesome for that time of year. Close inspection showed small blue, irregular rock-like prills in the turf. It was probably either Lebanon U-Form or more likely, their methylene urea/AMS particle (which I've used).


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## Greendoc (Mar 24, 2018)

In cool season lawns, early spring application of MESA, which is Methylene Urea + AMS, will get and keep that grass green. My guess is that the lawn applicator got down the fertilizer application in March.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

Greendoc said:


> In cool season lawns, early spring application of MESA, which is Methylene Urea + AMS, will get and keep that grass green. My guess is that the lawn applicator got down the fertilizer application in March.


Yup. That's the one...MESA. I couldn't think of the name. I had awesome results from an April application of it in 2018 on one of our family lawns. I'm interested in MESA as well, after having used it in the Lebanon blend with urea, Acelepryn, and Dimension.

But as much as I'm interested in MESA, I'm even more interested in METH-Ex 40 and U-Form 38 for September use to stand in for a bunch of apps in one. I think a blend of the two at high rate would be perfect in mid Sept.

We really have to be careful with soluble stuff at that time due to lingering Summer dormancy, but that is nonetheless the recommended timeframe. If done correctly, I bet this app could spoonfeed through mid October, taper off to a trickle in November and December, and have a bit of residual left for March/April...with a single app rather than weekly ones at very low rate.


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## Greendoc (Mar 24, 2018)

UForm lasts over a year at high rates and large particle sizes even in Hawaii. So slow to kick in though.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

Greendoc said:


> UForm lasts over a year at high rates and large particle sizes even in Hawaii.


That is so awesome! Overkill for me to use it pure at high rate, but awesome to have the option anyway, and for custom blended apps like my stand-in for Fall spoonfeeding.



Greendoc said:


> So slow to kick in though.


So you just add a kicker to it!

I need to find a supplier for these two products eventually. For now, I'll use the pre-made blends.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

Yeah, so for now, I'll continue relying on various pre-made blends of soluble/methylene mixed with organics and/or coated stuff. But eventually, I see myself using a methylene urea/urea formaldehyde mix as my base. This would be for late Summer/Early Fall spoonfeeding, Winterization, and gentle Spring Greenup through late Spring N nutrition all in one app. I can see the release curves working in my favor for root growth and possibly even somewhat reduced surge top growth during Spring flush/seedhead time...without PGR. Plus, it'll be environmentally friendly.


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## Greendoc (Mar 24, 2018)

Look for Nitroform or IBDU. Those are the products with the lowest solubility and and longest release rates. I would imagine you could skip spring and summer fertilization if you got the amounts worked out


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

Greendoc said:


> Look for Nitroform or IBDU. Those are the products with the lowest solubility and and longest release rates.


Thanks! Will do.



Greendoc said:


> I would imagine you could skip spring and summer fertilization if you got the amounts worked out


Exactly. I could probably make my own single app fertilizer if I ever wanted to. There are so many possibilities, and it's really fun to think about all the possibilities. But I'll take one step at a time.

Right now, I'm still getting comfortable with how the methylene ureas act in a blend with urea/AMS. Currently, Scotts Green Max is one of my favorite fertilizer blends. I apply it as my late season app (which I'd like to eventually be able to discontinue because Doug Soldat's research shows the late Fall soluble N uptake via mass flow leaves a lot to be desired at best). But that blend fires up the lawn gently yet effectively in early Spring when applied in late Nov or early Dec after growth stops/slows in preparation for Winter dormancy.

But I wanted to start thinking ahead for the future, as more methylene ureas are the direction I'm probably headed in over time based upon the goals I have.

Thanks so much. Let's keep this discussion open.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

Greendoc said:


> Look for Nitroform or IBDU. Those are the products with the lowest solubility and and longest release rates. I would imagine you could skip spring and summer fertilization if you got the amounts worked out


@Greendoc, thanks. I did a ton of research on my own, and came to the same conclusion. After doing so, I understand why you suggested Nitroform, and I now have a good idea how to use it.

I managed to get my hands on some, and am planning to experiment with it next Fall, blending it with methylene urea and ammonium sulfate and applying as my final app, but much earlier than usual. I'm very excited, since I've had excellent results with regular methylene urea up to this point.

It was hard to find. For anyone interested in it, I found it at Greenway Biotech in CA. They also have an Ebay store, and sell on Amazon in addition to their website.

It's Nitroform 39-0-0 in mini size (smallish prills), made by Koch. It's the slowest release of the methylene urea fertilizers, and is supposed to work over about 3-4 months in ideal conditions under high microbial activity, but under some circumstances certain fractions may last more than a year in the soil and mineralize extremely slowly.

I'd suggest someone who is unsure start with some of the faster acting methylene urea blends first (like Scotts, Lebanon/Greenview, etc.) to get a feel for how those work in your lawn initially, and then if you still want a longer-lasting product, you can get something like Nitroform and blend a little of that into your existing blend...which is my plan. Plus, it's fairly expensive stuff (at least $2 per lb online). I plan to only use about 10 lbs a year in my blend.


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## uts (Jul 8, 2019)

@Green I have been looking at slow release fertilizers for a while now and happened to find this thread which was very informative.

What did you settle on using for the longer term?

I have just been looking at Lebanon stuff because it seems they have a good presence in our area.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

@uts, for my late October app, which I was testing to see if it could replace the late Winterizing app at the end of the year (still have to report my findings one of these days), I mixed several different fertilizers containing methylene urea: Scotts Green Max, Lebanon Greenview Fairway (aka Country Club), and Nitroform 39-0-0. As far as I can tell, the high activity methylene ureas in the Scotts and Lebanon are basically used up now, but the 39-0-0 is doing its thing...grass is really green still. And that was from late October. I only used 0.25 lb/M of N from the 39-0-0, though. The 39-0-0 is almost entirely slow release N, and some of it takes up to 1 year to fully break down, apparently.


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## uts (Jul 8, 2019)

@Green thank you for this. I actually did quite a bit of research on these products and their availability and actually reached out to a few reps as well for availability and pricing.

The 2 best options (price, availability for our area, etc all combined) was either Umaxx or Lebanon proscape which has 2 formulations 40-0-0 (100% methex) or 30-0-0 (100% MESA). Both the umaxx and 40-0-0 are similarly priced around 4x.xx if getting a big quantity but the 100%MESA is 28.xx range (and I think I like this option more for getting some immediate release AS for all my apps).

There is also a product which has a 100% slow release methex AND 100%EXPO which is the controlled release potassium (I see a lot of usn
CT peeps are potassium deficient with low CEC soils) and that might be a good idea.

Would you be interested in getting anything like this?

I'm not sure if any of the other CT peeps would be interested in this.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

@uts, I am always interested in obtaining methylene urea/ureaform fertilizers (but not large quantities, really just a bag or two here or there as I don't have much storage space or a lot of cash to buy tons). They are not easy to get affordably, and the usual suppliers don't seem to carry much of them. I had to buy the ultra slow release 40-0-0 (not Lebanon brand) online last year to find it and still have some. I also still have some Lebanon greenview and Scotts green max. I would be interested in hearing who you contacted, etc. If you want to, you can send me details in a message at some point. Meth-X would be great to get in a 100% or near 100% formula if available and affordable. So would Mesa. No one seems to sell the 100% around here, since pros like the blended ferts and golf courses probably buy direct from reps. If we could establish a relationship with some reps, that might be ideal, but I don't know if they'd want to be bothered with small quantities. I remember someone local telling me he knew a rep well and got his fert from him. I never pushed for details as I didn't want to be intrusive or anything.

Also feel free to post basic info in the CT section.

I don't think Umaxx interests me at this point in time.


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