I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with nettles. My garden is full of them, they have a nasty habit of hiding in my rhubarb bed and attacking me when I’m harvesting some stems. During the summer months, it’s not unusual for me to suffer a nettle sting on a weekly basis.
However, I do love finding nettles on my plot as they serve a very important purpose, natural fertiliser! Nettles are a great source of nutrients for your plants and using them to make a plant feed is easy, albeit a little bit stinky.
To make your own nettle plant feed, you will need a container like a bucket or similar, water, something to weigh down the nettles and some gardening gloves (I can not stress that last one enough).
Simply pull up the nettles, taking care not to sting yourself, and break the nettles up.
Place them in your container and weight them down, I usually use a brick or large rocks from the garden.
Add enough water to cover the nettles and place a lid over your container to make it airtight.
Leave this for a few weeks to work its magic.
After about 4 weeks, you can use your plant feed. Now, beware, when you remove the lid, this stuff will smell foul! Brace yourself.
To use your feed, dilute it with water, about one part feed to ten parts water and voila, homemade plant feed.
Easy peasy nettle squeezy.
Interesting….Thanks for the tip 🙂
I have heard making this in the exact same way as you described but spraying it on plants to fight bug infestation. I did not know that you could use it as fertilizer. Good tip!
Honey
Great tip. I too have been stung while pulling rhubarb.Nettles love hiding in the courgette patch as well, that’s where I get stung the most.
Oh the smell – foul is the right word! Thank you for the info and reminder to make some. I have nettles a-plenty!
Timely reminder – thank you! AoF
I use nettle feed, not only great for putting nitrogen back into the soil, but when I spray brassicas, it helps counteract butterflies.
It does smell vile though – so always wear oilskins/waterproofs.
I soak down the stalks – nettle leaves themselves are great for food!
Pesto
http://connemaracroft.blogspot.be/2011/05/irish-nettle-pesto.html
Soup
http://connemaracroft.blogspot.be/2011/05/super-simple-stinger-soup-nettle-and.html
Omelette
http://connemaracroft.blogspot.com/2012/06/nettle-and-nori-omelet.html