Coffee grounds

Well, I'm excited! I picked up 2 lbs of grounds at a small Starbuck's at the food court at the Air Force Base BX. I can't get them on a regular basis because I live 50 miles away, but when I'm there I'll check. They had a container with a sign on it "Free for your garden." Yesterday morning I spoke with folks at two local Tom Thumbs (quik pik, minute market, 7-11, whatever they are called in your area). They immediately gave me a bag they had just pulled out to throw away. I decided I would go ahead and take it and pick out the paper/plastic . It wasn't bad, just put on a glove, and ended up with 8 pounds of grounds. BUT, they let me leave a small bucket with lid to collect the grounds in, saying they would give it a try. I weighed what I had collected over the last ten days at our house and it was a big whopping 3/4 lb. That's why I need help. Just not enough at my house. I did give the folks working there a small thank you gift of some home made chocolate covered cherries. That way maybe they will feel good about doing this for me.

Wow - very timely & what a great trade! Hope this works out for you - sometimes it's hard to get certain additions for the compost piles or garden, and real nice to find a good source.

gingerlily--the gift was a good idea.
And so is the "free for your garden' container.

Well, you sure got me going!!! I now am on a rotating 5 gal. bucket status with a coffee shop 2x week. I drop off an empty one and pick up the one she has filled!!! The nice thing is that they also dump in the filters!!!! Then I pick up another 3-5 gals from a Starbucks and then another bucket 3 x week from a convenience store. I soak shreeded computer paper i get from a store which I soak for about a week in the coffee grounds = the computer paper gets stained brown and makes not bad looking mulch!

I put it in the compost, all the beds (the beans and pigeon peas love it). What a great! idea. Thanks so much. Love my car when I pick it up (a total of about 10 gals of grounds every week...)it smell so good!!! A lot better than steer manure!

Is it possible to have too much coffe grounds in your compost? I have added grounds twice from Starbucks, and I don't think that I am in danger of overdoing things yet, but I am wondering if there is a point at which I should stop.

Like everything else, you'll want to achieve a balance. When I have excess, I mix it into the soil in containers, or mulch lightly with it.

I sprinkle it directly on beds that have leaves in them. I figure it will help there with the decomposition.

Coffee grounds can be used to make Bokashi, too.

What is Bokashi?

Here is what I found. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bokashi_composting

There are a bunch of threads in this forum on Bokashi....

Pages tagged "bokashi": http://davesgarden.com/tools/tags/tag.php?tag=bokashi

Please excuse my brief intrusion on your thread. Per admin, I am unable to cross-post this info in its' own thread as non-members would see it and be distressed. We are having a co-op for a product folks on this forum/thread my be interested in. Here is the link, http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/962566/

Thank you for your tolerance of my brief intrusion.

Regards,
Maggie

Are coffee grounds good for all plants or only certain ones? I am thinking about stopping at my local Starbucks to see fi they have them. I have a HB/BF garden and could use the boost, but I dont want to accidentally hurt any of the plants.

This message was edited Apr 4, 2009 6:29 AM

I've not seen any damage from them. They're a mild nitrogen (1 % ?) so they don't seem to hurt. I aim to keep it off the actual plant but have accidentally had grounds land on plants as I go flinging.

I think of it more as a soil amendment- more organic matter for the soil rather than fertiliser.

Karen

Thanks! I'd rather use a natural type of fertilizer (and a bonus that it's free!) than something with a lot of chemicals that would be bad for the critters in my garden and potentially end up in the ground water supply. I'm going to try it. can't hurt, right?

No, won't hurt and it is free. Keeps them out of the landfill, too, so it's a win-win. I use the grounds from my own kitchen and those from the local coffee shop. I have to pick up a bucket there today.

Karen

Karen -- are you working it into the ground now? I havent done it yet ... while weeding the past month or so... i've seen A LOT of worms... bet they'd like a snack.

No, I never till and don't dig more than necessary, I just fling the grounds, eventually mix them into the existing mulch with a rake or hoe or something of the sort. If left as the top layer UCGs get too dry and repel water, if mixed with other stuff they're fine. I just continually add more layers of OM to the top of the soil. My yard is strictly no-till, disturbing the soil as little as possible. Right now though I have an entire new forest of volunteer maple seedlings coming up. I need to get out there with my trusty hoe.

Karen

I mulch with coffee grounds, but there is little chance of them drying out as the area I live in receives lots of rain (outside Seattle).
I had read an article some time ago about a mulch of fresh coffee grounds repelling slugs. I only have access to the brewed grounds, and so far have not noticed any slug damage using them. The ultimate test would be for me to spread them around Marigolds & Nasturtiums here. In all the years I have used them, I have not noticed any damage whatsoever to any plants. As Karen indicated - best to keep them off the foliage.
I have used the brewed grounds in my orchard around my Blueberries. I mix it into the existing mulch, about a 2" layer. Helps keep the weeds down, and any that pop through are quite easy to pull. If I am working a new area, I will extract as many weeds as possible and then smother with CGs & paper/cardboard. This works quite well for me: clay-based soil.
I have found them to be an excellent soil amendment, and a way to make the worms smile...

Try Spraying your slugs with a solution of brewed coffee in a hand held sprayer. Um, no more of those slugs. Wait til right after it rains, cause the slugs climb out to keep from drowning. Great time to catch em in the open.

Here's link about killing slugs with coffee grounds - go towards the bottom for the info

http://www.plantea.com/slug-baits-coffee.htm

If I did that...I would have a front door jammed with snails and slugs asking 'more please' - riots in the garden!!!

I have had loads of slugs in the past especially in the spring. The last two years they aren't as many and no noticable damage. I have been putting the coffee grounds on my beds for a few years now, seems that may be the difference.

I've had a big improvement since I started using the iron phosphate.

Karen

I LOVE the iron phosphate!!! My dog doesn't like it (which is good) and the slugs love it....but the snails ignore it. Here there is a horrible disease carried by the slugs and snails called Rat Lungworm Disease. It is like Menengitis...no cure. Some people have died. We just don't go around munching on things in the garden!!!!

What the Iron Phosphate Brand name called? Here I've seen Sluggo. Is that the same thing?

Perhaps I mispoke....it is the Sluggo brand I like...

Sluggo and Escar-Go are common ones, but there are other brands, too. Gardeners Supply has one but I forget the name. Just look for iron phosphate as the active ingredient.

Karen

Sluggo is the GREATEST! And they have a new Super Sluggo or something like that, which also uses natural ingredients and works on earwigs, sowbugs, etc. I've been trying it in one bed to see if it makes a difference, and I seem to have less damage to some of the plants that didn't have slime trails, but were being eaten by something. Seems to be working!

Thanks, Guys

I have been collecting the coffee grounds from home in a Glad plastic container and refrigerating it until the container is full, then dumping it into my compost pile. No smell!

Clever!

My hubby saves coffee grounds, dries them in the sun, and stores them in whatever containers are available. This way they don't go moldy.

Coffee grounds can also be added to a worm bin if you have one.

my mom use to put coffee/tea grounds on her plants..and now i do..
when i get a ton.. several 5 gal buckets i add to my compost..no smell for me either
on the gardens..vegy or flower.. the earthworms show up big time..:)
one yr i put alot on the vegy garden..some were heaped..maybe couple inches..
checking things out mid spring..i brushed some aside..
WOW.. baby worms everywhere.. :)
im guessing the robin population boomed that spring..:) or some very fat baby robins..
lol
good stuff coffee grounds..

Have I told you my son got a summer job at a coffee place?
Yeah man!

WRG...first dibs on the grounds!

I just read through this thread again, and need some new advice. I have a new raised bed to fill for my fall/wtr garden. It'll have cabbages, broccoli, cauliflowers, lettuce and spinach. I just bought seven 25 lb. bags of MOO NURE organic compost (I'm not an organic gardener...) It has a slight manure smell to it, and I've read that truly aged compost doesn't have any smell to it. But, I've used Black Kow Composted manure right out of the bag before, and it smelled the same, so not too worried. Also, I have at least two months before I'll plant anything in this bed.

I'm putting together a mix of pine bark fines, builders sand, peat, and vermiculite to fill it with. I have access to coffee grinds by the bucketsful, and shredder paper, too. My question regards how to incorporate the compost and the coffee grinds into the mix for the new bed. I have been trying to get the worms to come, too, but that's slow going. Should I just mix all these ingredients together?

The other possible organic ingredients are in the three attempts at composters sitting in my side yard -- all just sitting there. They are plastic garbage cans that I painstakingly drilled holes all over (took me almost all day to drill all those holes in three cans...). At the time, I had lots of bags of leaves, so I dumped them into cans #1and #2. Can #3 is the "rotation can". Dump #2 into #3, and #1 into #2, then rotate the process. Well, the leaves have sort of shrunk down, but there's no heat or anything. I didn't expect any without any raw grass for nitrogen (lawn man uses a mulching mower....) I sprinkled in some dry molasses, but, hey, nothing's going on in those cans. I have an abundance of browns, and without some nitrogen, nada...I thought of buy some alfalfa pellets to cause some excitement...anyways, I also have another can with no holes that I have been chucking in all the GREEN cuttings from the yard. Mostly, my tomato vines and old weedy stuff I pull up here and there. That can seems HOT every time I open it! Could be from sitting in the sun all day, but, hey...it's some kinda heat going on in there and it's taking no time for my vines to shrink down.

Should I put this can of greens with the cans of leaves, and throw in the coffee grinds, maybe? I was throwing all my table scraps into the "browns", but there were so many flies over there in the beginning, it wasn't a regular practice after awhile. I'm still collecting table scraps and have been "hole composting" in my existing raised veggie bed, and in the rose bush bed.

How should I proceed to get all this stuff incorporated and into bed #2 by the end of August, so I can sprinkle my root crop seeds?

Much appreciated.

P.S. I think a good start might be to begin layering the shredder paper on the ground and tossing on the coffee grinds, like AlohaHoya did. I could do several layers like this til the worms come, then mix up the rest of the stuff and build up from there? How best to mix in the compost? Or do I use that as a whole separate layer on top? Do the root crop seeds want to start off in the compost, or grow down into the compost?

Thanks again, Guys!

Linda

Linda - if you mix everythig together and it starts to get hot, then you will not be able to sow seeds in it. Hot compost equals dead seeds.

To get mulched leaves to break down into wonderful, rich, black dirt, I put them in 25gallon pots and let the rain soak them. Just this morning I mulched a bed with some of the mulched leaves that had been in pots for a acouple of months and they had already started to break down. It takes roughly six months or so for them to completely turn into soil in those pots.

If you are wondering whether or not your MOO NURE is ready to use, set the bag in the sun for a few days, then stick your hand into the center. If it's hot, it's not ready. If it has just been warmed by the sun, it should be okay.

I would not combine manure and coffee grounds - too much nitrogren - I could be wrong about this.

Shredded newspaper? I've read that earthworms love this stuff, but I've never tried it.