5 Simple Truths About Adding Coffee Ground & Egg Shells To The Garden 

I think of my compost pile as another crop (soil) so things like coffee grounds and eggshells are fertilizer for my compost. 😉

My grandmother dug coffee grounds and eggshells into her rose garden every morning after breakfast. For fifty years. She had beautiful roses nearly all of the year, no insect problems, and she never put any chemicals on the roses.

1 Tbs pulverized egg shells (coffee/spice grinder) and 1 Tbs distilled vinegar. Combine, let foam for about 30 min. Add to 1 gallon of water. Calcium is now bio available. Water your plants with it.

Egg shells will cause your blender container to get scratched up. I use an electric spice/coffee grinder and it works great! Will break down shells to powder!

Luke doesn't try and be a wonderful awesome teacher He just is! A wonderful awesome teacher!

One word of caution about coffee grounds is that they still contain caffeine, which can stunt the growth of some seedlings. Coffee grounds work better around mature plants that are already established, or as a compost ingredient. The earthworms love it, and I've noticed they move a lot faster as a result.

I only use coffee grounds and egg shells in my compost pile, that way I know they have already had time to breakdown and are better suited to add to my garden.

I've been putting used coffee grounds around my pepper plants the last 2 years, and they have been loving it.

Ours works well. We add diced up banana peels too. We use a vitamix machine and it emulsifies it. We add half the pitcher to two gallons of water in our watering can. We do it about every 2 weeks and we get large harvests. 🤷‍♀️😁

Wonderful advise. Thank you so much!!

Very informative. Thank you.

Thanks for the tips. Very helpful!👍🏽

Thank you so much for explaining this.

Super-helpful. Thank you!

Thanks for the advice and truth

Thank you for the great information! ❤ your channel !!!

This was very helpful and very well explained.

Thank you and blessings...

Wow that is beautiful amazing

Such helpful info Luke. Thanks for sharing that info. So important to know and can make a difference in our gardens.

Great looking garden. ❤️ your channel.

I was just going to say eventually shell and coffee add value. Good items to toss into a bed being put to rest in fall.

Very valuable information, thank you❣️

Thank you for this great info. I hadn't heard about sterilizing eggshells but it makes total sense.

This is such useful and straightforward information so thank you so much 😊.

I never thought about salmonella on egg shells. Thank you for mentioning it.

Good tips,thank you.🙏

Thanks for this information

Thanks my teacher

Thank you so much for taking the time away from your own family to help us take care of ours with your knowledge, tips and tricks. I know your family is blessed to have you work so hard on what us placed on the table. Thank you so much for sharing with us 🙏🏼🤍

Thanks for explaining this for an amateur gardener

Great advice

Thank you so much for the advice about the semanella with the eggshells I had no idea I'm new to gardening and I have been grounding my exhales into powder but I did not know to bake them 1st so thank you thank you there

Thanks for the information very helpful as I have lots of eggs and coffee grounds daily. Most go to my compost.

Great video!

I watched a video from a woman who brought a plant back to life with plain ol' coffee. The plant looked amazing, as it was almost dead, apparently. So, now, every morning I take my leftover (from making one cup) grounds and put them into a glass coffee carafe I use for a lot of purposes, and I fill it up with water and the leftover bit of grounds. The water is a light tan. I water my plants with it, and dump the grounds there, too. I have noticed in the past two days, after four days of doing this, that the plants have perked up and the leaves have turned dark green. I don't want to overdo it, so will try to space it out over a couple of weeks before adding what amounts to a "tea" again. A coffee tea. Who would have thought?

Another great vid. Been watching him for awhile and I live in his area ! So even better 8 )

Good information. I never have sterilized my egg shells, but I will now.

Thank you for this! So tired if hearing about eggs under tomatoes to help them. I did try and never worked. I add eggshell and coffee year round to the same raised beds and started to worry about raising the acidity. Had noticed coffee grounds didn't seem to help with leaf growth like I thought it should. This explains alot. Thanks again!!!

Thanks that was a good overview

Thanks for reiterating these facts. I see posts weekly where gardeners are instructed to put egg shells in their garden to fix BER. They will argue with you and tell you that you don't know what you are talking about. I just tell them to educate themselves.

I have an Oster that I bought for $19.95 at Walmart, and I use it to powder eggshells, charcoal and old rotten drywall. I will occasionally run chicken bones through it as well. It works great! I thought for sure I would bend the blades, but it has held up very well, despite running some burn-pile charcoal through it that occasionally sparked as I hit a missed nail or something. I did NOT know that about the salmonella and egg shells; great info, thanks!

Love this. There is always a debate in the Facebook garden group about coffee grounds.

great review on egg shell & grounds. A lit of my egg shells(after baking) go to my quail hens,

To summarize: Just. Be. Patient. 😊

After blending into micro size I add to my worm bin. My garden loves the added worm casting😁

Thank you very much

My question has already been answered in the comments. I sure didn’t know about salmonella in the shells and thanks for that. I got some endrot in my tomatoes last year and solved it with cheap antacid tab’s ground into a powder then soaked overnight in water and poured around the plants. I received results almost immediately. Not a blemish one on the next setting.

❤all the information!!!!

Another good video. I love grazing the garden too. Yep, no cooties are going into the compost. 👌🏻✅🤛🏻

I throw eggshells and coffee grounds directly onto my garden plot all your long. In the spring it gets tilled in, during the growing season it gets layered on top of the garden with the grass clippings I put on the garden. This is the second year of my garden, started with a Bermuda grass yard last year, and my plants are doing so much better this year.

@MIgardener I use coffee in my garden from time to time. Instead of grounds I usually take a cup of leftover coffee and dilute it with a gallon of water. I use it on my blueberries and greens. They seem to like it. Am I harming my plants in any way? I use the grounds around my greens whenever I see slugs and snails. Something about the coffee keeps them away. Thank you Luke ...love your channel. I always learn something here.

I once added cheap coffee grounds strait to my soil….. killed everything 🤣🤣🤣 I didn’t know you had to use leftover grounds, not fresh ones 🤪

Love this info! I have coffee grounds! But beware of eggshells in the blender. They dull the blades so either get one from the thrift store, or pound them with the flat side of a mallet or in a mortar and pestle.

My grandfather always burried coffee grounds, raw veggie & fruit scraps, and egg shells to the compost bin for years. He had several bins and areas. Large logs laying on the ground in a pile, a compost bin for smaller branches, one bin that he added his scraps to, and one compost that was almost perfect that as he needed it we screened it to make sure big stuff wasn't still in there before using it. I have yet to get where he was!

I honestly use fish food as well. I make a mix of tea leaves bc I dont drink coffee sugar eggshells gind them up together. To me it works my first year hollyhocks are 5 feet tall. The leaves are bigger than my head. They definitely will be a good 8 ft tall next season. I'm so excited to see it.

You read in my mind! 😱😱😱

Well done again. Over time. This is by no means the first time you use these words because quite frankly, there is no snappy way to get things done when dealing with our soil. As for myself I prefer composting the materials mentioned by making a hot compost pile. Best way of getting nitrogen and calcium plant available sooner, and even then we cannot forget these 2 words , over time since it’s not happening overnight.

I put my coffee grounds and egg shells in my in garden worm tower. Works like a charm.

Brawndo, its what plants crave!!👍

I add all year long every year. Works great 😁 I grow beneficial nitrogen plants around my others like clover and toss all kinds of compost below the soil as soon as the ground unfreezes

Never mind you just answered my question!

For my compost now have I use bamboo leafs and some of Amaranths leaf 🍃 to make my vegetables growing up very fast

Wow!! I have been making eggshell powder, and Did not know this, it's bagged up and I thought was ready for use, is it possible to put it in the airfryer, if nit I will of course figure out a way, possible the grill and and using a cookie tray, thank you, such an amazing channel, East of Cadillac so your my go to expert Now!!! God bless you!!

found that adding eggshells and coffee grounds to the charcoal grill after I'm done cooking really helps and adds carbon to the mix.

Agreed!

nice video, good content

I put that stuff in my compost pile versus in with my plants.

I've read that you can breakdown eggshells in apple cider vinegar and in a few weeks it will create calcium solution that can be readily available to your plants. It does need to be diluted with water, tho.

Hi!! I really like the way you explain things and give extra info!!! Thank you! Also, thank you for clarifying that coffee grounds won’t change the PH. I didn’t know that! You mentioned this was because we wash the acidity away when we brew it. Could you also explain what would happen if I used fresh unbrewed coffee grounds? Or what if I used the coffee to water my plant? I was hoping to lower the PH for my tomatoes and pothos. THANKS! 😺

You have clearly highlighted why you rotate 3-4 compost heaps, so you have a fresh batch each planting season.

I use dried egg shells when making coffee each morning. I keep a can to empty the coffee grounds/eggs shells into and when it's full, I add it to one of my gardens. We have clay soil here and anything to loosen it up is welcome. I also add the soggy spruce needles that collect in the house gutters. LOL. The flowers and veggies seem to like it.

Do I use cleaned egg shells or fresh cracked straight to water for soaking to use for plants? I have fiddle leaf figs, a majesty palm, money tree and the peace lily!

Compost baby! Every once in a while I'll put my worms and put them in. Love your advice! Keeps me on my toes. Keep doing your vid.

What about adding vinegar to the eggshells to break them down to calcium and carbon dioxide?

I make a tea like fertilizer. I take Banana peels. Instant coffee, Epsom salt and lots of water and let it sit in a two litter bottle. I take crushed eggs shells when I setup my containers and add eggshells and my fert tea to the soil in the pots over the winter and let it sit under my uv lights with my plants that I allow to grow indoors over the harsh minnesota winters

Hi Luke, Starbucks gave me two full boxes of coffee grounds in loose trash bags that were in boxes. Total weight is about 50-75 lbs. It's early November here in NE Georgia. How do you suggest I use them in my 60 sq ft of raised beds? Should I spread them on top or mix them into the soil? Should I add it now or wait until next spring? Thanks so much for helping out.

My nightcrawlers and redworms take care of these things faster, I like to mix the coffee with rockdust and everything else especially kale plant thick stems. Worms also love the eggshells whole, because I noticed they like to shak up in it. Like a worm motel.

I grind shrimp shells and add to my compost. Not sure what it does but it feels right 😃

Thanks for sharing how long it takes.

in November every year, I take my leaves and run them twice through my mulching vacuum tool then add directly to soil (8ft x 16ft garden) - then spread some coffee grounds, dig out the summer worth of ash/dirt from my fire pit and then run the tiller and churn it all together before the first snow. sits all winter and then till again before planting in spring - gets me good zuccini, summer squash and tomaters. every other year i add 2 big bricks of new dirt and same amount of Peat moss. pretty healthy dirt. should i add other stuff?

I actually grind the shells and grounds in a magic bullet to fine dust, it seems to work better with nutrient uptake. Your tums solution is something I just tried, too soon for noticeable results.

interesting!

There was a study done by the Alabama agriculture extension I believe the name was, they found that coarsely ground egg shells performed roughly just as well as ag lime. And finely ground shells outperformed pure calcium carbonate as far as putting readily available for uptake calcium in the soil goes. My blossom end rot never came back after trying it

I put coffee grounds around my milkweeds to keep the aphids off. Works great.

I always pulverize my eggshells after sterilizing them in the oven. If I have banana peels I dry them and grind them up to add to my veggie beds for a hit of Potassium along with the Calcium. Sometimes I add white vinegar to the eggshells and leave it overnight. It is then strained and added at the rate of one tablespoon per litre of water. This makes a really fast acting calcium foliar spray.

I have read a magnesium deficiency in plants looks like calcium deficiency. Epsom salt is water soluble and immediately available

I put crushed eggshells in my raised beds to keep the cats from using it as a litter box. It works. I notice birds seem to like them and I've seen some of the shells get carried off by them. After the plants start coming up the cats have usually started avoiding the boxes. One cat still doesn't care and will lay on some of my plants. So this year I'm going to try putting plastic forks prongs up around the borders and plants.

Coffee grounds and eggshells...I throw both into the oven and / or dehydrator until VERY DRY. They're much easier to powder down with my huge rolling pin when they're dried. After powdered, I add them to my composter.

Are those tender sweet cucumbers? My tender sweet cucumbers from your shop are growing great! Love them!

I added crushed eggshells once and watched them being taken away by ants. It was amazing.

Hi! What organic fertilizer can i use to all plants? or is there one like that? by the way im new to planting.thank you

I am thinking of getting a worm colony started. I also have chicken. So can I pit the chicken coop waste in with the worms? Will it hurt the worms? Is it bad?

LMAOOO i saw a comment you made on a smash mouth video so i decided to follow your channel

I have used them in my carrot beds they do help but like you said not right away.

Soil amendment is a long term program. The key is to do it and keep adding these and other long term items each and every year. What you put in today is for the next year or two.

Would you please do a comprehensive garden tour? I think you mentioned that you were watering less because you were using a high humus soil. Also, you added a microbial booster this year. Do you use municipal water? Is it chlorinated? I understand chlorinated water will kill beneficial microbes. Do you have nitrogen fixing plants growing among your cultivatars? How are you managing pests? This may be too much for one video, but I’m so impressed with your yields.

So you mentioned coffee and no affect on ph.. though you didn’t mention the ph on eggshells.. it’s often said that eggshells play a role on raising the ph??? You are *extremely informative on all the information..

Exactly why everything in my garden go's into my wood chipper in the fall . Then go's into my compost pile.

Luke, I had a late start to my garden due to a major surgery. Purslane is taking over. I am sort of ok with it since I live in the southwest with lots of clay. I have added underground worm buckets to help my soil. Any thoughts on leaving purslane through the early spring? Btw I love your channel. I’m a new gardener, year three😊