Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: Sleepingpopman on June 08, 2018, 09:56
-
Morning everyone :) We would like your thoughts please ::)
We was told a long time ago that a drink of cold tea is good for plants & have
occasionally used as a feed, is this ok ? (it seems to be) & we could to add the
tea bags to the compost bin but this year we've been ripping the bags open &
emptying the contents in to mix with compost. (very time consuming I know)
as the bags didn't seem to compost down fully.
We have 1 darlic type bin & put grass cuttings, kitchen & garden waste in it
& then mix in about 40 tea bags a week. Is this ok ? & are we ok with the this
amount of tea. The compost usually goes back on to the veg plot in the end.
Keith/Sharon ;)
-
Looking it up on line it's possible that cold tea helps any leafy plants as it contains quite a lot of nitrogen but it also has other trace elements that may do more harm than good. Perhaps you're doing the right thing by composting them as the nitrogen will aid the breakdown in your bins plus keeping them from getting too dry.
-
I add in excess of 100 tea bags a week into my compost bins , as I bring them home from the office, and have done for a few years. Some I break open most I don't. They all break down in the end.
I also add coffee grounds every other week about 1/2 bucket full which I have from McDonald's.
-
We put our tea bags in the compost along with as much household waste as possible.
Have not used Darlic bins for several years , invested some time 'sourcing ' some standard pallets which make turning the compost easier , and also they take longer to fill.
-
Some tea bags are made from a plastic material and take a very long time to break down. Not the sort of thing you want to be scattering around the environment.
-
Some tea bags are made from a plastic material and take a very long time to break down. Not the sort of thing you want to be scattering around the environment.
Surely the other option would only be landfill so aren't we better at least getting the value of the tea for the soil?
I did at one time start breaking open all bags and only using the tea for compost and disposing of the bags but it was far too much work
-
We are quite old fashioned and buy leaf tea. The leaves are very easy to compost compared with bags. We also add our coffee grounds to the mix.
-
Have just looked this up , the material concerned is something called polypropylene which is used to seal the bag. One web site had responses to the plastic question , from the 'major' suppliers , they seem to be aware of it . There is also a list of those tea makers that don't use plastic , I didn't check how up to date the report was .
Something to read over a cuppa tea :lol: :lol:
-
My dad dries the bags out, and save the dried tea, discarding the bags (Many contain polypropylene).
He spreads a bit of the tea on the compost heap but also adds a bit around plants with coffee grounds to keep slugs at bay and add a little nitrogen.