Your Tomatoes Are Begging for Banana Peels #containergardenin

You know what? That banana peel you just tossed in the trash after your morning snack, it's actually gold for your tomatoes and peppers. I'm not talking about some internet fad. I've been farming for over 20 years, tried every expensive and cheap fertilizer out there, and I've found that banana peel fertilizer works better than those $40 bottles of Bloom Booster from the garden center. Today I'm going to share with you the old-timer secret to bigger, sweeter tomatoes and heavier peppers. It costs nothing. Your plants will go absolutely crazy. First, let me tell you why banana peels are so powerful. Banana peels are packed with three things your plants love, potassium, phosphorus, and a little bit of calcium and magnesium. Potassium makes fruit big, sweet, and deeply colored. That's the first number on those expensive fruit fertilizers. Phosphorus gives you more flowers and better fruit set. Calcium and magnesium stop blossom end rot and keep leaves dark green and glossy. Basically, a banana peel is a free, natural, complete fruit and flower fertilizer. When you throw it away, you're throwing away money. But a lot of people have tried banana peels and got nothing. Why? Because they used them wrong. Have you done this? Toss a banana peel on top of your soil or in a pot? It sits there, dries out like leather, and takes months to break down. Or you bury a whole peel, and a week later you've got ants and fruit flies everywhere. That is not fertilizing. That is making a mess. Today I'll give you three methods. Fay from the laziest to the most hardcore. Pick one and your tomatoes and peppers will go nuts. Method one, Fay, the lazy man's banana peel tea. This is the simplest and fastest. After you eat a banana, tear the peel into small pieces and stuff them into an old plastic bottle or a glass jar. Fill it with water and put the lid on. Set it in your kitchen corner for three days. Open the lid once a day to let the gas out. Fay, it'll build up. After three days, the water will turn cloudy brown. To use it, mix one cup of that liquid with four cups of plain water. Pour it around the base of your tomatoes and peppers. Do this every two weeks. The good thing about this method, it is fast Fay three days, and you are ready. The downside, it works fine if you don't eat a ton of bananas. Method two, Fay dry and powder. Save up about ten banana peels. Cut them into small strips with scissors. Spread them on a baking sheet and put them in the sun for two days or in the oven at 300 degrees Fahrenheit for two hours until they turn dark brown and brittle. Then crush them with a rolling pin or a blender until you have a coarse powder. This powder is your homemade potassium Fay phosphorus fertilizer. When you are ready to use it, scratch a ring around your tomato or pepper plant. Fay a shallow trench. Fay and sprinkle one tablespoon of the powder into the trench. Cover it with soil and water it in. Do this every three to four weeks. The powder method is convenient. It doesn't attract bugs, and you can store it in a sealed jar for the whole season. Method three, Fay the banana peel compost bomb. This one is the most powerful, but it takes a little more patience. You need a five Fay gallon bucket. Throw in banana peels, kitchen scraps, coffee grounds, crushed eggshells, dry leaves, Fay, whatever you have. Banana peels are the star. Build it like a lasagna. A layer of dry leaves, then kitchen scraps, then banana peels, then a sprinkle of old garden soil. Keep it moist like a wrung Fay out sponge. Turn it with a pitchfork every few days. In about three to four weeks, you'll have a bucket of black, crumbly compost. This stuff isn't just potassium and phosphorus, Fay. It is loaded with trace minerals and living microbes. When you plant your tomatoes, toss a handful of this compost into the hole and mix it with the soil. Even a puny yellow seedling will turn into a monster in a month. Now, let me give you an advanced tip that doubles the power. Banana peels need microbes to turn their potassium into a form plants can use. If you have a worm bin, throw the peels in there. Worms will turn them into castings in a couple of days, and worm castings are way more powerful than plain compost. No worm bin? No problem. Just dig a few earthworms from your garden and toss them into your compost pile. They'll speed things up. What plants love banana peel fertilizer the most? Number one is tomatoes. From flowering to harvest, tomatoes burn through potassium. Without enough, fruit is sour, thick-Fay's kind, and pale. With banana peels, your tomatoes will be sweet as candy. Number two is peppers. Peppers produce waves of fruit all season. Potassium keeps them hot, shiny, and heavy, and stops flower drop. Number three is eggplants and cucumbers, Fay saying, great results. And don't forget roses, zinnias, and hydrangeas. The phosphorus in banana peels will give you more blooms than you've ever seen. But there are a few traps you have to avoid. Trap 1-Fay don't just throw whole peels on top of your soil. They dry out like plastic. Water can't get through, and they attract ants. Always chop them, soak them, or powder them. Trap 2-Fay don't use banana peels alone. They're low in nitrogen. If you give your plants potassium but no nitrogen, the leaves will turn yellow. You need to balance it with a nitrogen source, Fay chicken manure, coffee grounds, or even diluted urine. Trap 3-Fay don't soak banana peels for more than a week. The water will go anaerobic and stink, and it can hurt your roots. Three days is perfect. Five days max. Trap 4-Fay when you use the powder. Don't dump it right on the stem. It can burn the skin. Sprinkle it in a ring around the plant and scratch it into the soil. Let me tell you a true story. A couple of years ago, my pepper plants were sad Fay. A few small fruit here and there. Nothing impressive. I started using banana peel tea every two weeks. One month later, those pepper plants had shot from one foot tall to over two feet. They were loaded with bright red hot peppers. My neighbor walked by and asked what I was feeding them. I said banana peels. He thought I was joking. Later, I gave him a bottle of my banana tea. He called me to say his tomatoes had never been sweeter. You might be thinking, I don't eat enough bananas to save that many peels. Here is a trick. Grocery stores often sell overripe bananas in a bag for a dollar. Buy them, eat the bananas, keep the peels, or ask at a juice bar or a breakfast diner. They peel dozens of bananas every day, and they're happy to give you the peels for free. You are saving them from throwing them away. You are not just saving money. Fay, you are turning one person's trash into another person's treasure. Let me do the math. A bag of organic potassium fertilizer from the garden center costs $15 or $20. Most of the time, it is just dried. Ground banana peels anyway. You can make the same thing for zero dollars. You are turning your daily garbage into garden gold. That is the best part of growing your own food fee, taking control, using your head, and watching your soil come to life without spending a fortune starting. Today, don't throw away your banana peels. Pick one of these three methods. If you are lazy, make the tea, Fay, three days, and you are ready. If you don't mind a little work, dry and powder them, Fay. Make a batch that lasts all season. If you want the most powerful results, build a compost bomb, Fay. It takes a few weeks. But your plants will explode. Your tomatoes and peppers will thank you. Comment below, Fay. What have you been doing with your banana peels? Are you going to try this? Hit like and subscribe. Next time, I'll show you how to make natural insect spray from onion skins. Take care of your garden, and it'll take care of your table. I'll see you next time.