Baking soda is one of the powerful things in the house. We use it for cleaning, disinfection of food, or even for aesthetic purposes. We can also use baking soda to take care of our garden. Today Hearten Side will discuss how baking soda can play a role in maintaining the health of our plants.
What is baking soda?
This simple, natural product is made entirely of sodium bicarbonate, a highly alkaline ingredient. When it comes in contact with acidic substances, it becomes bubbles. Now let’s take a look at some of the baking sodas we use to take care of our garden.
1. Reduces the presence of annoying aphids
Aphids are a type of little insect. They prefer to eat the tender stems of the tree, and they release a sweet sticky substance in the process. It attracts ants which causes a black fungus to appear on the tree. Subsequently, this fungus affects the photosynthesis process.
So it is a kind of disease for your tree. When this happens the new submarines become deformed and little by little the tree begins to lose its strength. You can spray your garden with a mixture of baking soda and soap to protect the plant from these pests.
2. To keep the leaves of the plant clean.
Plants need adequate illumination to survive. And to ensure adequate illumination, it is important to keep the leaves clean. If the leaves of the plant are dirty, you can use baking soda to clean them.
To do this, you need to make a dilute solution by adding about half a teaspoon of baking soda to one liter of pure, filtered water.
3. It can be effective in measuring soil quality.
We generally know that healthy soils are not too acidic or too alkaline. This is because the more neutral the pH of the soil, the more pest-free the soil will be and the faster the vegetation will grow in this soil.
What kind of soil is in your garden? And you can find out through baking soda whether it will help the plants to grow.
Just follow these steps:
- If there is red or purple cabbage, cut it and soak it in boiling pure water.
- After soaking for 10 minutes. The purple water that you see is pH neutral.
- Put some cabbage water in 72 separate cups. Add vinegar to one cup of it (since vinegar is acidic so water will turn pink due to acidity). And to another, add baking soda (since baking soda is alkaline so it will turn blue or green due to alkalinity). These are the control colors. At this color to understand whether the soil is perfect?
- Again in a pot, take some cabbage water and put one or 2 teaspoons of the soil you want to test in the pot. Wait 30 minutes.
If the water is Pink the soil is acidic. If it turns green or blue, it is alkaline. But if it stays purple from this, then understand the soil is perfect.
4. This helps you to get better organic fertilizer.
As we know, neutral pH soil is best for plants. We have explained in the previous point how the pH value of soil can be determined using baking soda. So let’s do something with the fertilizer. Organic manure is usually made by decomposing. All the organic waste in the kitchen. Such as cardboard, crushed stone, bones, chopped curry, etc.
And make sure it is well ventilated. Sprinkle a little baking soda on the organic waste to create a foul odor. However, keep in mind that giving extra baking soda can be harmful. Undoubtedly this organic fertilizer can help create a healthy garden.
5. To destroy cabbage pests.
Using baking soda to destroy cabbage pests can turn your garden into a healthy garden. For this, you need to take wheat flour with baking soda. Then mix it well in the ratio of 1: 1 and sprinkle this powder on the cabbage leaves. In this process, the insects die within 1 or 2 days.
6. Baking soda prevents ants from spreading.
As we have said before, baking soda mixed with soap is quite effective in reducing the presence of aphids and protecting plants from certain types of fungi. To reduce the presence of ants, baking soda as well as more powerful mineral fertilizers such as Visa mixtures (which are mainly water, copper sulfate,
Adding zinc sulfate, magnesium sulfate, a mixture of boric acid and hydrated lime) or Bordeaux mixture (water, copper sulfate, and hydrated lime), can easily reduce the presence of ants.
Here are 6 uses of baking soda that can help protect the health of our plants. Do you know of any other uses of baking soda for the garden? We want to hear about it!