Potato is a nutritional powerhouse that provides a variety of nutrients like potassium, vitamin C and others. Potatoes are more energy-packed than any other vegetable. They are fat-free, cholesterol-free, and contain more potassium than bananas. But what after you finish eating the potatoes? Can you compost potato peels or not?
Yes, you can compost potato peels, as they are not among the things you can’t compost. Potato peelings are great fertilizers and help in the significant growth of plants. Composting potato peels is beneficial, but one needs to be careful while adding them to the pile of compost.
In this article, you will find about composting potato peels, safety concerns regarding potato compost and the methods to compost potato peels. You’ll know about two methods to compost your potato peels if you stay till the end.
So, let’s get started.
Is it Safe to Compost Potato Peels?
You might be wondering if composting potato peels is safe or not. It is absolutely safe to compost potato peels but only by employing proper methods and precautions. Anything that is biodegradable can be composted. So, potatoes with a huge inventory of minerals will obviously strengthen the soil and can help in plant growth if used as compost.
Just make sure that your compost does not grow potato blight (a fungal disease) while adding rotten potatoes in compost. Hence, instead of throwing potato peels, you can compost potato peels in your garden.
Potatoes contain minerals such as potassium, nitrogen, phosphorus, and magnesium, which help in the overall growth of the plant. Potato peels have been used as organic compost for decades as they tend to increase the fermentation process by creating a lot of heat.
Among the other common problems that can arise by adding potato peels to the compost pile, potato blight is the most fatal one. Potato blight is a fungal disease in potatoes which starts from the potato tubers resulting in rotting the whole potato sack.
Potato blight affects not only the potato but affects other crops as well. And adding potato peels with potato blight can rapidly increase the number of microorganisms that can negatively affect the plants. So, before adding potato peels to the compost pile, just make sure that there’s no possibility of potato blight.
Avoiding potatoes with blight in your compost is not that difficult, though. You can avoid adding store-bought and not-so-fresh potato peels into the compost pile.
Watch This Video To Know If You Can Compost Potato Peels:
Can You Compost Potato Peels?
If you’re looking for how to use potato peels for plants, using them as manure by composting is the best way. So, It is worth learning the methods to compost potato peels considering the huge benefits they offer in the overall growth of the plants. Learning to compost potato peels ensures you do not leave potato peels in the garbage disposal and make no use of them.
Before learning how to compost potato peels, let’s look at the things essential for the composting process.
- Potato Peels
- Water
- Container
Below mentioned are the methods on how you can compost potato peels.
Method 1: Composting Potato Peels in a Container
This method uses a container to compost the potato peels. The process is as follows:
1. Add potato peels to the container containing water.
2. Close the container and leave it for 3 days.
3. Stir the container containing potato peels once every 24 hours.
4. After 3 days, separate the mixture of peels.
5. Pour the water into the designated plants.
Method 2: Composting Potato Peels in a Compost Pile
This method requires a compost pile for the composting process to occur. The process is as follows:
1. Add the potato peels into the compost pile with the right components.
2. Make sure to consistently keep the pile moist and also ensure that it receives sufficient oxygen to help them break down faster.
3. Turn the pile every week.
Finally, don’t ignore even a slight symptom of potato blight, as it will affect the plant’s growth. You can add a small number of potato peels at a time, which will make it easier to turn and mix them throughout the process. Don’t forget to bury the peels deep in a pile to avoid sprouting. Also, freezing or drying the potato peels before mixing them will help them break down easily.
Can Potato Compost Be Reused?
Confusion regarding the reuse of old potato compost is quite frequent among gardeners. So, can potato compost be used again and again?
Despite many traditional gardening materials suggesting replacing the compost each year, the reuse of any compost, not just potato compost, is possible as they last for several seasons or even indefinitely in many cases.
Reusing compost proves to be handy if you have a large number of pots, as emptying and refilling all the pots needs a lot of time. It is not only time-consuming but difficult and expensive too. Also, throwing away the old compost is not a good idea.
Conclusion
You now already have an idea on what to do with potato peels. The answer to any query like can you compost potato peels is obvious as composting is the most beneficial technique to reuse potato peels for plant growth.
Composting potato peelings roughly takes about a year. 79 per cent of the entire decomposition process is almost completed within 12 weeks, with the majority of the process happening in the first five-week. Making compost out of potato peels is not a big task, but without the proper guidance, it can turn into quite a hassle.
So, make sure you know how to properly compost the potato peels and avoid any consequences that might occur otherwise.
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Lastly, thanks for reading.