Only use black, unflavored coffee with this method to offer plants a source of nitrogen which can fertilize certain indoor and outdoor plants.
Another reminder: The coffee you water your plant with needs to be black. That may seem obvious, but pouring out your leftover brew that contains sweeteners or dairy could attract pests, like gnats. Even if you're just using black coffee, you should stick to doing this only once a week.
Rather than throwing them away, try recycling them in one of our interesting ways. Use coffee grounds as plant food. Dilute your leftover coffee grounds to make your very own homemade plant food. To make, mix one part leftover coffee grounds with four parts cool water, and water your plants once every other week.
"It's fine to use coffee as a fertilizer," our senior lab testing technician, Jonathan Chan, says. "However, you should be careful because coffee can raise the acidity of the soil. Caffeine also is known to have a negative effect on plant growth."
Can You Water Plants with Coffee? Plants that like coffee grounds also respond well to watering with coffee liquid. However, it is a fairly strong fertilizer, so this watering should not be done more than once a week. To prepare the mixture, boil the coffee and pour one and a half times as much water.
Acid-loving plants, such as azaleas and blueberries, love coffee. However, tomatoes and lavender may not fare well if you use coffee to fertilize them.
You can also make coffee ground "tea." Add 2 cups of used coffee grounds to a 5-gallon bucket of water. Let the "tea" steep for a few hours or overnight. You can use this concoction as a liquid fertilizer for garden and container plants.
Don't just pour it down the drain — you can use it to fertilize your plants, both indoor and outdoor. Coffee grounds (and brewed coffee) are a source of nitrogen for plants, producing healthy green growth and strong stems. Coffee also contains calcium and magnesium — both of which are beneficial to plant health.
The organic contents of cinnamon are perfect for increasing the root growth of plants. This spice's auxin content works to help the stem cuttings or seedlings sustain growth, all while protecting the plant with its antimicrobial and anti-bacterial qualities.
We recommend using about a teaspoon of coffee grounds per gallon of water. Let the coffee grounds and water mixture steep for a few nights, stirring occasionally, then strain the liquid through a cheesecloth. The remaining liquid can be used to water, and gently fertilize, your houseplants.
Is Banana Peel Water Good for Plants? Using banana water for plants doesn't have many cons if you do it correctly. Banana peels contain essential nutrients for plant growth, like magnesium, phosphorus, and calcium. The amount of nutrients infused into water is very unlikely to cause fertilizer overdose.
It's not just the grounds that can be great, either. That cooled-down coffee you couldn't finish could come in handy as well. The Spruce suggests that plants who love lower pH levels of soil (like African violets, rhododendrons, pines, etc) can occasionally be watered with cold coffee.
But the reasoning behind using banana water is sound: Bananas contain a lot of potassium, which is an essential macronutrient that boosts plant growth, strengthens stems and helps plants better resist drought and pests.
Eggplant, peppers, broccoli, cauliflower and leafy greens, to name a few. But don't go overboard. Since it takes a while for the shells to decompose, Uyterhoeven recommends applying eggshell fertilizer to your garden or indoor plants just twice a year—in the fall and spring.
Soaking used coffee grounds in water will break down some of the nutrients in the coffee to make a great fertilizer your plants will love. For this add 6 tablespoons of used coffee grounds to a gallon of water and let sit over night. In the morning stir and strain out the remaining coffee.
While plants need nitrogen (remember the NPK on fertilizers), too much nitrogen will create lots of green leaves but few berries or fruits. This means potassium-rich banana peels are excellent for plants like tomatoes, peppers or flowers. Banana peels also contain calcium, which prevents blossom end rot in tomatoes.
'One method is to sprinkle a small amount of cinnamon directly onto the soil around the base of your plants,' says Diana. This is probably the most simple way to apply the spice, but you'll need to make sure you avoid contaminating the base of particular plants that can be damaged by cinnamon (more on this later).
What Other Pests Does Cinnamon Repel? Apart from insects, lice, and mites, cinnamon repels rodents and other unwanted guests including rats, mice, squirrels, raccoons, snakes, moles, rabbits, and weasels. It can also kill harmful fungi that can cause diseases in certain plants, so it's a useful tool for any garden.
According to many gardeners, cinnamon is just as effective when applied to a plant's stem when you plant the cutting. It can stimulate root development in just about every kind of plant that you grow in this fashion and you only have to apply it once.
The absorption of these nutrients encourages more rapid growth in the plant. Therefore, pouring soda on plants, such as Classic Coca Cola, is inadvisable. Coke has a jaw dropping 3.38 grams of sugar per ounce, which would certainly kill the plant, as it would be unable to absorb water or nutrients.
When repotting plants, thoroughly mix in a quarter cup of grounds for every 4 to 6 cups of potting soil. By blending it into the soil, it will release its power slowly. All without the worry of clumping together and holding too much water in place around roots.
The shells also contain other minerals that help plants grow, including potassium, phosphorus, and magnesium. Eggshells are, therefore, an effective and inexpensive fertilizer for outdoor garden soil and houseplants.
For houseplants. To perk-up droopy or dying house plants, mix one packet instant coffee with a few tablespoons of tap water—or sprinkle the grounds directly on the soil and water as usual. The nutrients and minerals will be an instant pick-me-up for the leaves of the plant.
Watering plants with milk is fine providing you mix it with water first. Milk contains proteins, vitamin B, sugars and minerals like calcium that are beneficial for plant growth, increasing their health in the case of crops like apples, as well as deterring pests and viral and bacterial diseases.
'Sugar water can conversely cause damage to plants that are otherwise growing healthily by changing the way their roots absorb moisture and nutrients. Sugar water can prevent plants from getting the right nutrients from the soil and kill the plants instead of helping them.