Composting Fertilizers Garden Myths

Garden Myth: Miraculous Banana Peels

Photo: theweekendagriculturist.wordpress.com

It’s hard to miss the media hype about banana peels and their practically miraculous properties in the garden. They’re full of potassium, is the main claim, and plants need potassium. Just add them to the soil and your plants will grow like never before, many garden miracle sites insist! Facebook users share this kind of information as if they’d just discovered the Holy Grail. And yet, there is really nothing miraculous about banana peels. 

The common garden myth is that you should “feed” banana peels to your garden plants or even houseplants, either whole or chopped up or turned into banana tea. However, try it and you’ll see. In most cases, if you remove the wishful thinking factor, plants so treated will do no better than other garden plants that didn’t get the treatment.

Yes, banana peels do contain minerals, especially potassium and magnesium, and can be used, once decomposed, to fertilize plants. That sounds promising! However, most garden soils aren’t seriously lacking in potassium and magnesium. Plants will only absorb minerals if they need them, so adding more to a well-stocked soil won’t improve your results.

OK, though, let’s assume your soil really does lack potassium and magnesium (we’ll assume you’ve done a thorough soil analysis to find that out). Why then add banana peels? Many other plant residus contain more potassium and magnesium than they do (scraps from avocados, potatoes, melons and squash, notably). And you probably already have fertilizers you could apply that have a decent share of the two elements. Plus, unlike most other plant residues, banana peels contain no nitrogen worth mentioning, and that is the one mineral that really is lacking in most soils. If you “fed” your plants nothing but banana peels, they’d likely be in serious trouble.

Banana peel tea is even less interesting for plants than banana peels. Photo: helpingninjas.com

Dropping banana peels at the base of plants is pretty innocuous, neither terribly useful nor terribly harmful, although they’ll decompose much more rapidly if you chop them up first. Banana tea? Why dilute a product that isn’t all fabulous to start with? Might as well use the peel whole! And as to adding peels to houseplants … well, fairly little decomposition goes on in pots indoors, so any benefits will be very long term. And besides, aren’t you concerned about fruit flies? 

Finally, actually dropping banana peels into the bottom of a planting hole to nourish the plant—a common recommendation—is probably going to be more harmful to the plant than good for it. As the peel decomposes, that will leave an air pocket (not a good thing), then the soil will likely subside, causing the plant to sink, also not good for the plant. 

Actually, banana peels are just an organic plant waste product like so many others, best used in the compost bin, where a mixture of products, each with their strong points and their weak ones, combine to make a really great garden product: compost.

Use, do compost your banana peels (along with other table scraps) and use the compost in your garden, just don’t expect miracles!

Garden writer and blogger, author of 65 gardening books, lecturer and communicator, the Laidback Gardener, Larry Hodgson, passed away in October 2022. Known for his great generosity, his thoroughness and his sense of humor, he reached several generations of amateur and professional gardeners over his 40-year career. Thanks to his son, Mathieu Hodgson, and a team of contributors, laidbackgardener.blog will continue its mission of demystifying gardening and making it more accessible to all.

6 comments on “Garden Myth: Miraculous Banana Peels

  1. I had a plant that was left in the office during covid. I broke it into pieces and put it in Banana water and today it is beautiful after 7 months. I have about 7 plants from that one stalk. Sometimes you just have to try things and see if it works for you.

  2. Pingback: Which Plants Like Banana Peels? – Houseplant Heaven

  3. Again, thank you for saying so. I actually know ‘someone’ who puts a whole banana into staghorn ferns annually or so. I know it doesn’t hurt them, but it just seems weird. This whole tea business is even weirder, but some insists that it helps.

    • Gwenith Alexander

      I don’t know about using them in the garden but the banana tea made anoticable difference to my indoor ferns … better than a seaweed solution …. I did a test comparrison. Please don’t debunk things out of hand!!!

      • Sorry, but this was not done “out of hand”: it has been scientifically tested. I’m referring to studies by Linda Chalker-Scott, a scientist specializing in plant care and author of several books on the subject. She found banana peel to have limited effects on garden and potted plants.

        I’m glad that banana tea works for you compared to seaweed fertilizer, which is not, according to the label on my product, recommended for banana plants. No explication is given as to why, but possibly it’s a bit too salty for them.

      • Oh, goodness; I am not one to dismiss something such as this easily. Although I would not do it, I can not dismiss it completely without knowing more about it. If I grew staghorn ferns and ate bananas, I might share the peels regardless. I just do neither, and think that it is strange that my colleagues give his staghorn ferns whole bananas. (I would think that they would have potential to attract opossums, which he dislikes.)

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