As of: February 4, 2024, 3:19 p.m
By: Ines Alms
Comments
Press
Split
Many people swear by beer for leaf care on their houseplants.
But not all home remedies are good for you.
About the advantages and disadvantages of barley juice.
Anyone who uses home remedies in the garden and in the house for their houseplants often saves a lot of money and environmentally harmful additives in commercial products.
But using baking powder, lemon juice, etc. is not always a good idea.
The use of beer is also popular.
In fact, the stale remains of beer, in moderation, are a suitable fertilizer for plants.
Does this also apply to the leaves, which the barley juice is supposed to give shine and protect against pests?
Dust the leaves of houseplants regularly
Leaves should be dusted regularly.
Leaf shiners and home remedies such as beer are intended to care for the plant.
© Westend61/Imago
Houseplants never get a rain shower that could wash their leaves.
So they are helplessly exposed to the dust in the living room, which clogs their stomata and deprives them of the light on the tops of the leaves and the air they need to breathe on the undersides of the leaves - which is necessary for their healthy growth.
This affects the plants especially in winter because, according to
My Beautiful Garden,
the heating air also dries out the leaves of the houseplants and stirs up a lot of dust.
It therefore makes sense to occasionally shower large-leaved plants such as ferns or the dragon tree with lukewarm water.
But many species don't like that either, especially those with hairy, waxy leaves.
You can find even more exciting garden topics in the regular newsletter from our partner 24garten.de.
Often the only thing that helps is to remove dust from the leaves by hand.
The use of banana peels, milk or beer to rub the leaves is often recommended online.
This apparently gives the leaf surfaces a nice shine and could replace leaf shine sprays.
This treatment is also intended to protect against pest infestations such as spider mites and aphids as well as pathogens.
Beer is harmful to the leaves - so is water
Even if the plant shines beautifully after the treatment, this is not a good idea in the long term.
Gardener Volker Kugel explains on
Stuttgarter-nachrichten.de
that in this way the plant's stomata become blocked, which inhibits plant growth.
Instead, he recommends using a soft cloth and lukewarm rainwater to clean the leaves.