Do houseplants like milk?

Well, thanks for the feedback, folks. I must say, giving milk to houseplants doesn't strike me as a good idea, but....

Hunt, re wasted water – I live in one of the wettest parts of the country. There is no water shortage. Our main problem is getting it to drain away fast enough. When I live in Oxfordshire I was careful with water and only used water-butt water or cold tea to water plants, indoors or out. Now, it's more a case of the water needing to be careful with us.

Besides, I usually use the end of the washing-up water to wash food residue from plastic containers. Some of them I even re-use for other purposes before recycling.

A thinned out milk solution is a remedy for mould on pumpkin leaves, but I wouldn't use it anywhere else.

Re lemon trees - peeing on them is supposed to be good, as long as you have a man about the house with the necessary handy gadget of course. Mind you, when my son had a BBQ one night, and all his army friends turned up, I think they killed his lemon tree with kindness. So only do it occasionally. And not when the neighbours can see!

Thanks Nelliemoser I shall pass on your tips to the OG, he may listen to you .... I've suggested that and clear vinegar and replacing the car mats and scrubbing with biological wash powder (dry) then hoovering up .....(also works well for sick).
Sorry Bags your topic has taken a turn for the worse

Dare I confess? When my lemon tree needs water (it drinks a lot) I fill an un-rinsed semi-skimmed one litre bottle with water and tip it into the plant. My orchids also get the same - but I only water them once a month. So far the half teaspoon of semi-skimmed diluted in nearly a litre of water hasn't had any adverse effects and doesn't smell. And neither does my bin.

Surely all this rinsing is wasting an incredible amount of water?

My boss a few years back would tip the remains of her milky coffee into the pot-plants in her office and next thing there was an infestation in the office of what looked like fruit-flies, and the infection control people who were called in tracked the source to her office and the milk souring (we were 8 floors up).

No that's a completely different one Tegan. My link was only about rinsing out milk cartons and juice cartons. Both good apparently. I would also have thought it would make the plant pot smell but I suppose it depends how weak the remaining solution is

Apologies if nightowls link says the same [my pooter won't let me on it; it's a bit slow sometimes] but Monty Don said the other week that if you put nettles in a bucket of water and leave for 4 weeks it makes the most amazing liquid fertilizer [just cut the top part of the nettle off and leave the rest to grow back for the butterflies].

We always rinse the empty milk bottles and put them in the recycling without the lids and assume the weight of everything else will crush them.

We also have an interim recycling box inside bags. I havevfound it's a really good idea to rinse cat sachets first, too, as the stink from those is appalling.

Rinsing water from sprouting seeds is good for houseplants!

Nelliemoser

I can not remember any smell from the house plants.

Frank

Don't do it! If you put milk on your house plants they will stink to high heaven when the milk sours. I have seen smelt it with office plants.

OGM try washing milk out with a solution of bicarbonate of Soda it neutralizes the acids and does better than anything else. It works for sick as well. I have spilt milk in a car boot yuk!

I rinse all my containers too, Bags

My recycling bin is in the garden too. I'm thinking of the bin men. I expect they have to put up with quite a lot of pong from rubbish. No need to make it worse for them if one can help it. Besides, I was taught to rinse out milk bottles, and have been told that recycling plants don't want food residues left on stuff.

So I also rinse other recyclable plastic containers. I have an interim recycling box in the wash-house and if I didn't get rid of food residues, we'd be inundated with field mice.

Bags

Since my wife passed away I have never bothered to buy house plants but I do keep my garden reasonably stocked with plants.
Generally I like to do something different each year.

Frank

Bags

My re cycling bin is in the garden so I don't tend to notice the smell.
I generally buy my milk in 4 pint containers from Iceland or Asda for £1 and it generally lasts me for about a week unless I get a lot of visitors.

Frank

I call it milk manure and always empty the rinsing s over the nearest plants which don't get so well watered .

Yay! Thanks, nightowl

put them out...

It was a plastic supermarket bottle, Frank. Still a bottle, though not the traditional kind. I swill them out so that I can crush them flat for the recycling bin. It would smell a bit cheesy if I out them in unrinsed.

For Bags

www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/houseplant-fertilizer-zmaz09aszraw.aspx#axzz2YFrSXZaf

Poo.... think of the smell! The OG tipped the 'Bridge Club milk' in the front passenger seat area of his car..... can't get rid of the pong!

Hi Bags

All I can say was my mother poured the swill on to the houseplants and as far as I remember no plant was harmed. They all lasted a reasonable time but a lot of plants have a limited life anyway.
Since I left home myself and my wife have always purchased milk from the supermarket in cartons or bottles so we did not tend to swill them out.
Oddly enough I have not seen a milk bottle for a long time.
I don't think we have a milk man on our estate.

Frank