I recently had a bad case of potato blight in my grow bags and I'm wondering if it's safe to reuse that soil in my flower bed, or if I should just throw it away entirely. What are my options?
2 Answers
Honestly, I would recommend getting rid of all that soil. Even if you’re not planting potatoes in that flower bed, the spores can spread to other plants around and might affect your neighbors too. Better safe than sorry!
"Blight" covers a lot of different fungal and bacterial issues, and some forms can also affect ornamental plants like roses, so it depends on what you're dealing with. If you want, you could repurpose the bags for fall crops like kale or radishes that aren't impacted by blight. To be extra cautious, you could try sterilizing the soil using solarization. Just dump it out on a tarp, cover it with clear plastic, and let the sun do its thing for a few weeks. But if that's too much hassle, tossing it might be your safest bet!
Good to know! Solarization sounds like a lot of work for me. I’m leaning towards tossing it to be safe. What about the grow bags themselves—is there a risk they’re infected too?
Thanks for the advice! That's kinda what I was thinking. Do you think the grow bags themselves could be contaminated? I wanted to use them for melons with fresh soil.