_IMG_8256By Anu Panchal

Here’s a scenario that makes Jim Schanstra feel sick: Your lawn starts to look brown and your homeowners association gets upset. So, you call a lawn service, and they come down and blanket your yard with pesticides and herbicides loaded with chemicals. Later, your children and dogs frolic on the lawn, getting the chemicals all over their hands/paws and putting them in their mouths.

“You’re (actually) poisoning your family with your (chemical-based) lawn service,” Schanstra claims.

A cleaner, safer alternative is what Schanstra says he offers with his six-year-old company, Organic Safe Lawns (Organic SL). Operating out of his home in Wesley Chapel with three employees and his wife Julie as the office manager, Organic Safe Lawns serves customers from right here in New Tampa and Wesley Chapel all the way to Lutz, Odessa, Westchase, Palm Harbor, Land O Lakes, Zephyrhills, Carrollwood and South Tampa.

Many companies treat and spray your lawns and shrubs, but Schanstra says that there is a crucial difference between him and most others in the Tampa Bay area.

“Our difference is that we are using an organic fertilizer (and pesticide) versus chemicals and our results are as good or better — and they’re much safer,” Schanstra says. “This is a serious business and we take it very seriously.”

Schanstra’s products are listed on a database of the Organic Materials Review Institute. While an OMRI listing is laborious and expensive to obtain, it certifies that his products are suitable for organic farming, Schanstra says. The organic nature of his products (that also are available for purchase on Schanstra’s website, OrganicSafeLawns.com) means that they will not burn out the lawn like many chemicals do. He explains that his research shows that although even organic materials can be toxic in heavy doses, in the right amounts, they are vastly safer than man-made chemicals that can cause harm in even minute doses. Schanstra also notes that non-organic products obtain their ingredients from chemicals and inorganic salts that won’t break down.

Organic SL has a detailed menu of services Schanstra offers, including turf and weed control, pest and disease control, irrigation and soil sampling. Monthly service starts at $40 a month, and no contracts are required. If you refer a friend, you get one free month of service. During a normal twelve-month service, Organic Safe Lawns treats grass every month and shrubs and palm trees twice a year.

Schanstra, who was born and raised in the Chicago area, obtained his Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) degree in Business from Greenville College in Greenville, IL, but a family legacy led him towards a more hands-on career in engineering.  Schanstra says he had worked with his grandfather, a master mechanic with General Motors, and his father, a superintendent of automation, since the age of twelve. He honed the skills they taught him while working for the Chicago Blower Corporation. He later founded his own company in Chicago, FTI International, which grew into one of the largest designers and builders of automated assembly lines, and he says he remains active in the company today, despite having “retired” to Florida twelve years ago.

It was while working with his cousin on another venture, however, that the seed was planted for Organic SL. Schanstra and his cousin started a company that used bioremediation to clean up the sites of defunct gas stations.

“Bioremediation is (what happens) when you use natural biology to fix an ecological problem,” Schanstra explains. Instead of digging out the soil contaminated with petroleum and incinerating it, Schanstra and his cousin created a solution of seven strains of bacteria that they pumped into the soil around the defunct gas tanks. The bacteria would “eat” the petroleum, leaving the soil clean. During a visit to Arizona to check out one such site, however, Schanstra says he noticed something that changed his life.

“Whereever (the technicians) poured the (bioremediation) product, the weeds were about eight feet high,” he says.

He took his product to a Florida company that shared his commitment to organic values, United Agricultural Services (UAS), and they discovered that the fulvic acid in their product was acting as a bridge to the plant, increasing uptake of the fertilizer by 70 percent. That’s when it occurred to him that the product would work wonders as a fertilizer for Florida lawns — an accurate prediction, with St. Augustine, Bahia, Bermuda and Zoysia cultivars among the strains that responded beautifully to the treatment.

 

A Safer Approach To Pesticides & Herbicides

Partnering with UAS, Schanstra has developed organic fertilizers and pesticides that all source their ingredients from nature rather than chemicals. For example, the nitrogen in their fertilizer is sourced from chicken urea, and the pesticides are pyrethroids, organic compounds that derive their active ingredient from the chrysanthemum plant.

The weed killers or herbicides Schanstra uses are derived from chemicals, but he states that he uses the safest ones on the market and that he uses the weed killers only to spot treat trouble areas of your yard during his monthly visits to clients.

Schanstra sold his products to golf courses and later through his son’s commercial landscaping service before setting up Organic SL six years ago. In addition to being a state-certified pest control operator, Schanstra also has a Green Industry-Best Management Practices certification.

Though he’s always had a fertile (pun intended) imagination and keen business acumen, Schanstra says there is a personal impetus behind Organic SL. About 12 years ago, his wife, Julie, was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s large cell lymphoma.

Although he couldn’t “prove” his theory, Schanstra says he was convinced — through his research with UAS — that the large amounts of concentrated DEET (N,N-Diethyl-meta-toluamide) pesticides she was exposed to as a child on a Minnesota property contributed to her cancer, so he was even more determined to find alternatives to current lawn care solutions.

“If I’m going to do this, I’m going to do it for all the right reasons,” he says. “And now (with Organic Safe Lawns), the price point is good, the customer wins and we’re doing good for the community.”

Schanstra believes that selling quality products and lawn care services isn’t enough. Equally crucial, if not more so, is the importance of educating Florida residents about their grass growth. Organic SL clients even receive a newsletter with their monthly statements that includes seasonal tips about organic lawn care.

“St. Augustine grass requires 2 pounds of nitrogen per 1,000 square feet per year (to stay healthy),” Schanstra explains. Many companies put down more than the basic requirement because it results in faster, greener grass growth. However, he says too much top growth weakens the lawn’s root structure and renders it susceptible to fungus and diseases and often results in lawn “burn-out.” He adds that Organic SL technicians are careful not to saturate lawns and plants.

“We spot treat with a backpack. We don’t blanket (your lawn) with chemicals.”

Like all licensed pest control technicians, Schanstra’s employees are required to do two hours a year of continuing education, but Organic SL employees do at least four hours. It’s that kind of service that attracts and retains clients such as Robin from Wesley Chapel, who signed up for Schanstra’s service six years ago when the business first started up.

“(I liked the idea of organic lawn care because) I garden extensively and did not want to be working around unsafe fertilizers and pesticides,” Robin says.

After retiring from his manufacturing business in Illinois, Schanstra was happy to move back to this area. He had visited his grandparents in Largo as a child and bought one of the first spec homes in Hunter’s Green in the late 1980s. But now, he finds that he has a problem.

“I just can’t sit still,” he confesses. “I found I couldn’t stay retired.”

In fact, now that Organic Safe Lawns is running at a steady clip, Schanstra is already studying for the state-mandated test for aquatic certification so he can maintain and repair ponds, too. He was horrified to learn about the chemicals that are currently in use to clean ponds and says he’s been researching organic alternatives.

“I’ve got solutions already,” he says.

Jim Schanstra of Organic Safe Lawns can be reached at 393-9665, by emailing OrganicSafeLawns@verizon.net or by filling out the contact form at OrganicSafeLawns.com.

 

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