Coffee Time

Every year, as the perennials emerge, they get a haircut from anything I left for the birds over the winter. Then they get a sprinkling of coffee grounds around them. Not to wake it up, but to keep the slugs away. I started that years ago, and it has served the garden well. The holes we get on leaves each year since then are usually after the Japanese beetles hatch.

Last Saturday I gave the sedum out front haircuts. Then I sprinkled them with coffee grounds. There were also the tulips and one daylily starting to pop up, and they got some coffee grounds love too. May as well. Can’t hurt, I don’t think …

The tulip and crocus areas out back also got the coffee treatment. Hoping it deters sir bunimous from chomping down. If not, I have an all natural powder I buy. It worked at the little house up north to deter deer and bunnies. The downside of that is it looks not so pretty, and it is only good through a couple rains. Hopefully the coffee grounds will work and it won’t be needed.

It’s time to start saving coffee grounds

Every spring there comes a day when I say to my husband, “It’s time to start saving coffee grounds.” He knows why. They go on the plants in the garden as soon as the ground starts to thaw. The slugs don’t like them, the squirrels kind of don’t like them, and some people say they fertilize the plants. And they are free. And the plants have done better since I started doing that – many years ago.

Today was the first application day. I would say probably a couple more weeks and we’re done.