We are aware of how good milk is for our bodies. It’s backed with nutrients and minerals that improve our overall bodily functions. But aside from drinking it for nourishment, did you know that you can use milk in the garden?
The nutrients it has, like calcium, potassium, and phosphorus, are great from plants, too. They would greatly benefit from this natural fertilizer. Here are 7 clever ways to use milk in plants to keep them healthy and grow beautifully.
Preventing fungus
Placing water-diluted milk onto the surface of plants is an excellent way to prevent fungus disease, mold, or rot.
Experts recommended mixing 1 part milk for every 2-3 parts water for this. You can then put the mixture into a spray bottle and use on your plants every 10 days or so. It’s best to start this early in the growing season.
Milk on tomato plants
Milk can be excellent for tomatoes but you can’t be using it too willy-nilly.
Top gardeners recommend using a mixture of 1 part milk and 9 parts water and then spraying on your tomatoes once every few weeks until mid-summer. This should help protect your tomatoes from diseases.
Using milk to deter insects
Milk can also be an excellent way to deter bugs from taking up residency in your garden. For it to work for this purpose, however, you must use whole milk.
This is according to a study found in the Journal of Eco-Friendly Agriculture.
If you are looking to use milk to prevent bugs, it should also be milk from a cow. Applying whole milk from a cow to your garden has been shown to deter mites, thrips, aphids, and other annoying garden pests.
Milk improves the health of soil
Soil will absorb the vitamins and fat from milk. This means your soil gets healthier the more you put on it or your compost pile.
Some gardeners will pour a diluted watered-down milk solution onto their soil but others enjoy just sprinkling powdered milk over the soil the areas they feel could use it.
Mix in some molasses with your milk
One way to increase the effectiveness of all the benefits mentioned is to mix milk and molasses. This gives your garden an added boost of the same sugars to keep your plants strong and healthy.
This combination has also been shown to prevent weeds by altering soil conditions to ones unfavorable to their growth.
Milk as fertilizer
The nourishing properties that humans and animals get from milk is also beneficial to plants. This includes calcium, which has been shown to be able to strengthen plans as well as humans.
The sugar in milk has also been shown to help yield healthier crops. Using milk for fertilizer in plants as a fertilizer might be just what your garden needs.
Use milk in the garden to disinfect
Using milk to disinfect pruners instead of bleach can be just as beneficial to them. Milk will take on antiseptic properties when applied to areas that receive direct sunlight.
Milk is and will always be a healthy substance not just for you, but for your plants, too. Using milk in the garden from time to time will help your plants get the nutrition they need to help them grow beautifully in full bloom.
Source: Garden Myths/HarvestToTable