Gardeners are always looking for new and cheap ways to spruce up their flower beds, and this could be the answer to a thriving garden this summer. If you’ve ever found yourself throwing away any used coffee grounds, you may want to rethink.
In actual fact, you could be sitting on a gold mine, as many avid gardeners have discovered the kitchen item’s uses across their outdoor spaces. Coffee grounds can work wonders for a number of plants, helping to provide them with essential nutrients all while keeping away those unwanted pests. How does it work exactly? Well, the ground is rich in three things: nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium.
These three elements work together to deliver key nutrients for a plant to grow strong and healthy. Not to mention, coffee also provides trace minerals such as magnesium and copper, which also work to support plant development.
Away from their nutritional benefits, they also happen to be great at improving the structure of your soil.
Once the coffee grounds begin to decompose, they start a process which enhances biological activity, attracting earthworms which play their part as soil engineers.
With this natural change, you can transform everyday garden soil to a nutrient-dense space for growth without needing harsh chemicals that can damage your garden’s ecosystem. On top of that, the grounds are helping to bid farewell to pests.
When areas in your garden are treated with coffee grounds, there tends to be a drop in visits from pests. Both the strong scent and the texture work to deter slugs, ants, and cats from invading your much-loved plants.
Gardening tools and equipment can seem overwhelming, and more and more people are beginning to question the toxic chemicals they’re using in their outdoor space, and so this natural strategy could be the way forward.
Vulnerable plants will be protected from pests like aphids without killing your plants in the process.
The specific plants that will thrive with coffee grounds include rose bushes, as the boost of nitrogen promotes lavish flowering, all while strengthening its resistance to disease. Alongside them are acid-loving plants such as hydrangeas.
Thanks to the kitchen scrap, their already striking colours intensify because of the acidic enhancement from the coffee – even more so in alkaline soils.
Similarly, you will see vast improvements with the likes of rhododendrons, camellias, and blueberries, who flourish from the enhancements of their acidic growing conditions.
Another key here is your vegetables, such as tomatoes, potatoes, and aubergines, which can especially benefit from coffee grounds when using small doses of coffee. Even the likes of broccoli and lettuce and chicory react well to this natural fertiliser.
For best results you should dry out your coffee grounds thoroughly before they go anywhere near your garden.
As opposed to creating a thick layer, mixing the coffee into the top few inches of soil or blending them throughout is key – this helps to avoid any blockage of water from getting to your plants’ roots.
Everything is done best in moderation, and the same goes for your application. Try to apply just one to two tablespoons per plant, and limit this to around four times a year, because overdoing it can create an excessive amount of acid and cause more harm than good to your precious plants.
