Here’s Why You Should Give Your Plants Coffee

As humans, we tend to grow bored with eating the same foods. Expanding your palate can be an invigorating, refreshing experience, and as it turns out, the same might be true for plants. This doesn’t mean burying a bite of hamburger into the soil of your Spineless Yucca, but there are proven benefits to hydrating your beloved plants with coffee.

So, you’re probably wondering why in the world you’d water plants with coffee. For caffeine lovers, that cup of joe is a literal lifeline but because sharing is caring, we strongly encourage you to consider treating your beloved greenery to a sip or two.

For one, diluted coffee is a great fertilizer for certain plants. Coffee grounds and brewed coffee provide the nitrogen that plants need for growth and stem strength. They can also repel pests like slugs and snails, and attract earthworms, which while creepy, help water to seep deeper into the soil and assist with getting oxygen and aerobic bacteria down to the plant’s roots through tunneling.

When using the coffee ground method, it’s important to note that only specific plants interact well with fresh grounds, which increase the acidity of the soil. Those include but aren’t limited to azaleas, blueberries, hydrangeas and lilies, says GardeningKnowHow.  So make sure your plants thrive in acidic soil before tossing a handful of fresh grounds into the pot. Otherwise, rinse the grounds beforehand to give them a near neutral pH, which prevents them from impacting the acidity of the soil. 

As Bustle reports, the nitrogen along with magnesium and potassium in coffee also helps to kill off those pesky weeds and promote healthy plant growth, respectively. 

And in the event that your green thumb takes an unexpected leave of absence, try using coffee as a substitute to keep your plants quenched and thriving.