As the leaves break down, gently cultivate them into the planting area. It has also been used to as a top dressing around soft fruit bushes. Comfrey can also be used on other plants that benefit from high doses of potassium, like tomatoes and runner beans. As the leaves are high in potassium, they make an excellent fertilizer. After allowing them to wilt, you can use the leaves by chopping them up and placing them in a trench with main crop potatoes. The leaves can also be added to potato crops as a fertilizer. Just be sure there are no ripe seeds, and that no pieces of root are attached to the base of the leaves that go into the compost pile. In addition, the leaves contain calcium, phosphorus, potassium, and trace minerals drawn deep from the subsoil. Pacific Northwest gardener and author Mary Preus writes about comfrey in The Northwest Herb Lover’s Handbook (Sasquatch Books, 2000):Ĭomfrey can play an important role in compost making, The considerable leaf mass of a mature comfrey plant, cut several times in a season, can add plenty of high-nitrogen green material to the pile. Dig carefully and remove as much as you can of the roots, and then dispose of them. Do not rototill this plant, and always wear gloves when handling it. If you avoid using herbicide, you may find additional uses in the garden for the comfrey you remove by hand. Northwest Coalition for Alternatives to Pesticides has information about this chemical. While it may be tempting to take the quick path and use RoundUp to get rid of your comfrey, you may want to consider the health and environmental consequences of this product, whose active ingredient is glyphosate. Any bits of root left in the soil can produce new plants. Comfrey ( Symphytum officinale) has a fibrous root system which is very deep and difficult to eradicate.
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