Cinnamon is a clear staple used in the kitchen for our food, especially when it comes to cooking and sweet treats. But this spice can also be used beyond the kitchen, in your garden, and to help with your plants.
The spice can help fight fungi that can grow on your plants, such as slime mold, and can help fight away mushrooms. A fungal disease and white mold can affect over 360 plant species, including beans, peas, lettuce, and members of the cabbage family.
It’s easy to identify by its symptoms, which include water-soaked spots on blossoms, stems, leaves, and pods. This causes the leaves to wilt, turn yellow, and eventually die.
It is possible to make a cinnamon spray for the plants by mixing the spice with water and letting it sit overnight to set. Then, strain the mixture through a coffee filter and put the results into a spray bottle. Once this is done, spray the stems and leaves of the plants that have fungi, and they will start to look healthier.
If you have a problem with insects gravitating toward your plants, cinnamon is a good deterrent. Ants, in particular, avoid areas where cinnamon is powdered, so this is a great way to keep the small insects at bay.
GardeningKnowHow said: “If you have a problem with ants in your home or greenhouse, cinnamon is a good deterrent. Ants don’t like to walk where cinnamon powder lies, so summer ant problems will be decreased.”
It is recommended that the spice be used to deter pests both indoors and outdoors if you sprinkle powder over them. Not only cinnamon, but coffee grounds can also be used, as they are considered “essential” for use in the garden.
GardenersWorld.com advised: ‘The safest way to use coffee grounds in the garden is to add them to compost containers or worm bins. Used grounds break down well, and homemade compost is superb for improving soil and growing healthy plants.”
While scattering coffee grounds directly around your plants can be beneficial, they caution: “While applying coffee grounds directly onto the soil around most plants is usually fine, this should be done with care and moderation, as using grounds in this way is never a one-method-fits-all approach.
“The chief potential problem is that if applied in large quantities to the soil surface, the fine particles can clump together and form a barrier that prevents water and air from reaching plant roots,” they added.
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