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garden<br />
8 wellness<br />
Using Tea & Coffee<br />
In The Garden<br />
After a busy morning in the<br />
garden, there’s nothing quite like<br />
sitting down with your favourite<br />
beverage. But there’s plenty you can<br />
do with tea and coffee in the garden<br />
besides simply drinking it.<br />
If you take the time to make a pot<br />
of fresh coffee (rather than instant),<br />
you’ll have a ready supply of<br />
coffee grounds. These nutrient-rich<br />
leftovers contain several minerals<br />
including nitrogen, magnesium,<br />
calcium, potassium and there are<br />
lots of ways you can use them in the<br />
garden.<br />
Here are some ways coffee can<br />
be used in the garden:<br />
Combat slugs and<br />
snails<br />
If you’re looking for a natural<br />
way to keep slugs and snails away<br />
from your plants, coffee grounds<br />
are a great weapon to include in<br />
your arsenal. Simply put a circle<br />
of the grounds around the plants<br />
you want to protect. Slugs and<br />
snails will be put off by the rough<br />
texture and won’t want to cross over<br />
the grounds to reach your plants.<br />
Caffeine is also toxic to slugs and<br />
snails – another reason why they<br />
will be reluctant to come near your<br />
coffee grounds.<br />
Improve your compost<br />
Throw leftover coffee grounds<br />
into your compost bin. As they<br />
are rich in nitrogen, this will<br />
help improve the quality of your<br />
compost.<br />
Add to your soil<br />
You can simply sprinkle coffee<br />
grounds onto your soil to boost the<br />
nitrogen content.<br />
Create a liquid<br />
fertiliser<br />
Take two cups of leftover coffee<br />
grounds and add them to five<br />
gallons of water. Leave to steep<br />
for a few hours and you’ll have a<br />
free and natural fertiliser for your<br />
garden.<br />
More of a tea drinker? Don’t<br />
worry; we’ve got tips for using tea in<br />
the garden too:<br />
A boost for compost<br />
Just like coffee grounds,<br />
used teabags can be added<br />
to your compost bin<br />
or directly to soil to<br />
boost the nutrient<br />
content. You don’t<br />
even need to<br />
open the bag<br />
first as it will<br />
decompose<br />
just like other waste that you add<br />
to your compost bin. Just be sure to<br />
remove any tags that are attached to<br />
the teabags first.<br />
Treat mild sunburn<br />
If you’ve caught the sun while<br />
gardening and have a painful spot<br />
of sunburn, place a used cooled wet<br />
teabag on the area and it will help<br />
soothe the sunburn. If you have<br />
sunburn over a larger area, you can<br />
add teabags to your bath to create a<br />
soothing soak.<br />
Repel pests<br />
Some gardeners claim that weak<br />
tea can help repel pests. Decant into<br />
a spray bottle and use to spray the<br />
leaves of your plants.<br />
Feed your roses<br />
Teabags can be used to create<br />
a natural fertiliser for your plants.<br />
Roses in particular are said to<br />
benefit from the nutrients found in a<br />
used teabag.<br />
So, there you go, next time<br />
you’re enjoying a wellearned<br />
coffee or tea break<br />
in your garden, save the<br />
grounds or the teabag<br />
and see whether they<br />
can give your garden<br />
a boost.<br />
yourwellness.com
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