5 Tips For Using Coffee Grounds In Your SC Garden

Welcome back to the CCR Blog. This year sure has been a roller coaster for everyone! Back in March we decided to take a little break from posting here on the blog and figure out how this corona-lifestyle is going to work.

Autumn may be closing in on us but there is still plenty of time to get out to your garden and tend to your plants! For residents near our cafe in summerville, we leave 5 gallon buckets of spent grounds next to our walk-in cooler behind the cafe. Please feel free to swing by and get yourself some grounds! We just ask you return the bucket so we can keep filling them up!

Now let’s get back to it! Here we have an article by guest writer Clint Whitworth from LawnStarter.com :)

Just like there’s nothing like that perfect fresh-brewed cup to perk you up, coffee, or more precisely coffee grounds, also can be a wake-up call for your South Carolina garden. 

Savor your coffee and save the used grounds from your brew, or visit Coastal Coffee Roasters for some of our brown gold to add to your flower and vegetable gardens. 

Why are coffee grounds good for your plants? Coffee grounds contain nitrogen, potassium, phosphorus, copper, and magnesium – all minerals perfect for your garden.

1. Soil Testing

Knowing the acidic value of your soil is the key to growing a healthy garden. Coffee grounds help the soil’s acidic balance, act as a natural pesticide, fertilizer, and mulch additive. 

With more than 180 types of soil in South Carolina – some acidic and others more alkaline – your backyard garden may be a mix of clay, sand, and loam. Testing the garden soil before adding any kind of fertilizer helps you determine how much coffee grounds to use.  

The pH scale ranges from 1 to 14; extremely acidic soil is at the high end, alkaline at the low end. Garden soils with a high or low pH balance keep vegetation from absorbing nutrients. 

2. Coffee Ground Mulch

Coffee grounds help protect the soil but only as an additive to mulch, compost, straw, or foliage. Laying thick blankets of coffee grounds with high amounts of caffeine may damage plants. Some plants are more sensitive than others. 

How to use coffee ground mulch: Spread the grounds around in other forms of organic mulch to reduce the competition for water, sunlight, growing space, and nutrients. It also helps if you rake the grounds to keep them from clumping together.

Mulching Tips

• Mix the coffee grounds on top of a thin layer of soil and then cover with leaves or bark mulch.

• Apply grass clippings and chopped up leaves to the coffee grounds – 1/3 portion each.

• Add a nitrogen fertilizer to grounds placed directly into the soil. Coffee prompts microorganisms to reproduce (while the fertilizer feeds the plants).

• Store old coffee grounds in airtight containers to use during the next gardening season.

3. Coffee Ground Fertilizer

Coffee grounds have a good amount of nitrogen – which with potassium and phosphorus make up the mixture for most fertilizers. The grounds work as a slow-release type of fertilizer that works well with plants native to the area. 

Coffee Fertilizer Tips

• Sprinkle a thin layer of grounds into the soil or add them to your compost bin. 

• Mix old coffee grounds into organic fertilizers – minced leaves, pruned brush remnants, shredded newspapers, or grass clippings.   

4. Acid-loving Plants

Recycled coffee grounds have already lost most of their acidic qualities through the brewing process, but acid-loving plants like blueberries, carrots, azaleas, radishes, and some of South Carolina’s native species benefit from that slight boost of caffeine. 

Keep in mind: Organic coffee without additives is much better for your plants.

5. Coffee Grounds and Pets

Caffeine and coffee grounds are poisonous to dogs, cats, and other pets!  If you add grounds to your garden or landscape, be sure no furry critters can get to the soil.

Make the most of your coffee and coffee grounds

Just as you love a good cup of joe, your plants enjoy the nutrients from your coffee grounds. Nature has its own way of giving back to Mother Earth. Ground coffee beans can help to make your garden grow.

Clint Whitworth is a retired real estate agent who alternates spending time between his cabins in Colorado and Wisconsin. He enjoys fishing, hiking, skiing, and growing an eco-friendly vegetable garden on both properties.