Coffee, Tea, and Beer

Coffee, tea, and beer are three things that played a major role in my life this last semester.  Well, at least, a major role in my life within my horticulture class.  It goes like this...One assignment was a group project in which we had to form a hypothesis, carry out an experiment, record results, and make conclusions.  So my group chose to apply beer, tea, and coffee as fertilizers to tomato and zinnia plants.  We compared the results of these fertilizers to plants that were fertilized with Miracle Grow.  Why did we chose beer, tea, and coffee?  Well we knew that more often than not flat beer goes down the drain on Sunday mornings and tea and coffee grounds just go into the trash.  Since we knew each of these beverages contained nutrients required by plants for growth and development, we decided to test them on plants.  Also, when one searches online, there are gardening sites that suggest ways to incorporate coffee, beer, and tea into uses on your garden.  We did not use any of these recipes.  Instead, we sprinkled grounds, beer, and Miracle Grow on to groups of plants.  In the end, the plants that were fertilized with Miracle Grow grew the tallest.  We knew these plants would grow well.  The plants that were fertilized with coffee grew taller than those given beer and tea.  We expected the coffee to do well but we also expected tea and beer plants to be more successful than they were.  Now that I have seen the affects of these leftover beverages on tomatoes, I may start using coffee grounds on my tomatoes that I grow during the summer.  Since I am not a coffee drinker, I will be getting my coffee ground from Starbucks because a few years back Starbucks started a program called Grounds For Your Garden.  This was something we learned about when researching for our project.  In all, the experiment was took time, but I did learn from it and it was kind of fun.  Just thought I would share this tid-bit of information.