Composting Coffee Grounds

Composting Coffee Grounds / What's Compost

Composting has numerous advantages. It is the main requirement for healthy planting. It can take place almost anytime even without exerting effort.

Composting, often described as nature’s way of recycling, is the biological process of breaking up of organic waste such as food waste, manure, leaves, grass trimmings, paper, worms, and dog poop, etc., into an extremely useful humus-like substance by various micro-organisms including bacteria, fungi and actinomycetes in the presence of oxygen.

Actinomycetes are similar to fungus in the way they grow and spread, but its distinguishing elements are that the types of materials they are efficient at decomposing. The active nature in this microscopic bacteria and the sheer number present (about 10 million per 1 gram of soil), make them highly effective at breaking down materials like tree bark and other hard organic material.

Today, the use of composting to turn organic wastes into a valuable resource is expanding rapidly in many countries, as landfill space becomes scarce and expensive, and as people become more aware of the impact they have on the environment.

Composting Coffee Grounds / Uses For Our Morning Cup of Joe

For most people, coffee had become an important part of their morning routine. It is an addictive beverage that came from coffee beans. Excess coffee grounds that are being produced by grinding coffee beans, and the residue of coffee after brewing are just wastes as some look at it and it automatically goes to our trash cans but if we come to think about it, those were actually not worthless.

Coffee grounds have a lot of purposes that we just do not realize. We can use it as insect repellent, hair shine solution, skin exfoliant, deodorizer, cellulite reducer, and there are even products for grooming pets that actually came from coffee grounds. It can even help remove object scratches.

After we use it with such purpose, we suppose that it is already time to throw it away but we can still use it for composting.

Composting Coffee Grounds / Mixing It Up

Coffee grounds when mixed with soil release a compound that helps balance the nitrogen in composts. Camelias, Rosebushes, Azaleas, and Evergreen are acidic plants and these plants benefit more from coffee because it is rich in Nitrogen. You do not even have to exert effort emptying your teabags too.

Tea is also good for plants and teabags break down easily when mixed with compost. These are natural fertilizers to our plants and coffee grounds can even repel pests in our plants. You can eliminate the expenses of buying fertilizers which may also harm our environment by using coffee as natural fertilizers which is completely safe to the environment.

The caffeine it contains helps plants’ roots become healthier and the acid it contains is actually water-soluble.

Once mixed with water, it will be separated so most of the acid goes with the coffee we brew and there are a lot less acid in the remaining.

The activity of the bacteria in composts also moderates the acid it possesses. As coffee grounds have a lot of purposes, it has been proven to help us environment, and economic wise.

Sources

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080707171641.htm
http://www.sustainableenterprises.com/Business/coffeefert.htm

Thank you for visiting the Composting Coffee Grounds page.

For more information on composting follow these links:

Definition of Composting

How Does Composting Work

Anaerobic Composting

Composting Techniques

Commercial Composting

Composting Newspaper