Coffee Ground Mulch | From the Ground Up

Coffee grounds are a commodity that a lot of households have around because of coffee drinking at home, but because of the popularity of coffee kiosks, we now have larger and larger supplies of coffee grounds available. It is a resource that can be put to beneficial use in the garden, either by putting it into our compost piles or using it as food in our vermicomposting farms. And it is also a product that can be used as a mulch. You can put down about a half inch layer on the ground and then use a larger mulch product on top of that to keep the weeds down and keep the moisture high in the soils where you've watered. The one thing you want to keep in mind is that you don't want to put down more than a half an inch of the coffee grounds because it's so fine it can get compacted and that would create a layer that would be hard for water to penetrate through when you're watering the gardens. There are some garden myths about whether coffee grounds can be a preventative for different pests in the garden, such as slugs, and there doesn't seem to be any research information that substantiates that. However, coffee grounds have been reported in publications to prevent pathogenic molds from developing in garden plants. If you have further questions about using coffee grounds or other products as a mulch or in your composting at home, contact your local Extension office. I'm Donna Hoffman from the University of Wyoming Extension, and this is From the Ground Up.