The TRUTH About Using Hydrogen Peroxide In Your Garden

Hydrogen peroxide is claimed to be the "swiss army knife" of gardening, but does it actually work the way people think it does? We did a ton of digging on the topic, and in this video we share it all with you!

IN THIS VIDEO

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TIMESTAMPS
00:00 - Intro
00:37 - Disinfecting Soil & Aeration Claims
02:58 - Disinfecting Tools Claims
04:17 - Powdery Mildew
05:32 - Root Rot
06:19 - Fungus Gnats
07:43 - Soaking Seeds
08:12 - Killing Weeds

DISCLAIMER

[cathybranly]

I promise I was listening, but I was really admiring the amaranth, sunflowers, cosmso, and zinnias behind you!

[montaramike]

my yard was covered with Bermuda grass. I laid down large pieces of cardboard over the weeds and put manure and compost on top of the cardboard. I planted a veg garden on top digging holes down through the cardboard where I planted seeds. Had some bermuda grass come up through the cardboard, but not a lot. The next year put another layer of cardboard, manure and compost and planted another garden got hardly any bermuda grass. Now I just put new layers of compost and manure each year, no cardboard and have hardly any weed issues.

[sharonhoffer]

The first time I used HP was when I grew some Frangipanis from seed. I sprouted them indoors and then they got the dampening off issue, so I wrote to a grower in Thailand and he suggested the HP treatment, which worked really well. I think it’s good to use on a specific problem but not as a cure all for everything in the garden.
I use methylated spirits to clean my secateurs etc.
I do recommend to people to use HP to kill fungus gnats for indoor plants however, but an even better way of avoiding fungus gnats is to use a bark free potting mix for indoor plants, such as a coir based potting soil, as the gnats like bark. Works for me 😊

[FloraM]

That's really good to know about powdery mildew, thank you! I'll give this a try.

[markklecka]

You're a good and patient teacher. My wife and I have learned a lot from you

[stacyq]

I had root rot with my hydroponic strawberries. I used “force of nature” since that’s all the craze in my hydroponic groups. It did actually help.

[davidniemi]

I did a germination experiment this spring with large numbers of (over 160) hard-to-germinate pepper seeds. Soaking in water, tea, 1% Hydrogen Peroxide, sanding the seeds, and trimming the seeds, plus a control. I did not find a stastistically meaningful advantage for any of the preparation methods in terms of germination speed or rate, and hydrogen peroxide was worse than the control in rate. Last year I had tried soaking pepper seeds in hydrogen peroxide for different amounts of time at 1% or 3% concentration, and found that soaking very long had very negative consequences. So thank you for bringing some of the hype about hydrogen peroxide to the foreground. There may be constructive uses for it, but they are hard to pin down and they are most likely to be found with subtle and carefully chosen uses.

[scottscriticalmass]

What a fantastic way to support Planet Wild, which is a wonderful organization... I hope your video results in getting at least 200 new members signed up. Cheers Kevin...

[sarsattacks]

the interesting about hydrogen peroxide is that it is no longer advised to pour it into wounds for the EXACT reason as this. It kills good bacteria that actually help the healing process (the bacteria depend on you to live, so it is their incentive to help you survive). The only time to do this is very specific situations, like stepping on a rusty nail that could have the anaerobic bacteria tetanus.

[chrislewis]

I laughed so hard when you said Eric may have been in charge of that patch 😂

[gabrielmoura]

I have used h2o2 diluted on water with sunflower seeds for microgreens. It increased the germination ratio.

[katherineguevara]

As you said, hydrogen peroxide helps root rot. But you said that root rot can be fixed by watering less, the problem with this is if you’re doing hydroponics, you’re not watering your crops in the same way that you would with soil. There is no soil in hydroponics. The roots grow directly in water, so you cant just water less, This is intentional. Using h202 adds oxygen to the solution. Thus allowing us to not use soil. I’d love a video about hydroponics. It’s how I garden currently because I don’t have a backyard yet.

[eddeewow]

Hi Kevin, you just confirmed my suspicion the whole time since I came across your channel during the pandemic. As a pure Filipino from Cebu, I am immensely proud of all your achievements. I love all your videos. You're one of my inspirations in planning to start my own backyard garden once I'm able to retire someday. More power to you!

[darrylt]

Part of me feels that we might need more research on fungus gnats. I say this because from personal experience and observation (with only 3 years of gardening) that fungus gnats might be a solution to gardening than a problem. Think flies detecting gas from rotten food so they feed and breed to help eliminate the stench and spoiled content.
I've had a tray of plants die because of fungus gnats during my 1st year of gardening. Placed the tray by the window with an opening of about .25 inches and there's screen window as well. Eventually, plants started growing by the numbers. One morning, I noticed a great number of fungus gnats by the window and on the plants. I started placing sticky traps and saw hundreds of stuck/dead gnats but they just kept coming until one day plants on the tray started dying and soon had to toss the tray.
Months later, I started growing mango and avocado plants in my backyard. Didn't take long before fungus gnats started to appear on the plant and soil. I thought it was game over and decided to quit on these plants. A month goes by and these fruit plants continue to thrive despite seeing fungus gnats. A year has passed and these plants are still thriving, some are rapidly growing nicely with no site of fungus gnats. I no longer see fungus gnats as a threat as I continue to see on my other plants and herbs but all are thriving nice and healthy.
So I wonder if fungus gnats detect fungus gases from infected plants and do their work feeding and breeding on fungus. But sometimes the fungus has grown so rapidly that the gnats couldn't keep up thus killing the plant but we happen to see the gnats as the threat because of their presence. Just my theory.

[JoyoftheGardenandHome]

Now that's a sponsorship I can get behind, Bravo!

[travistaylor]

What?! You finally got an Espiritu Sancti?! That's awesome. I remember how rare it is from the house plants episode.

[GrimmGardens]

Also true for wounds! Alcohol and h2O2 dry out and kill you good bio inhibiting your body’s natural ability to heal. Good water clean out and sterile bandage. Antibiotic ointment is fine too if starts to look angry… lots of studies behind this. Soil = skin

[fanaticforager]

Congratulations on your Filipino 🇵🇭 Heritage, because I Admire your Dynamic as a Community, with Strong Family Values, & Cultural Heritage(s) ✊🏽also my Fiancée is Also Proudly Filipina ✨🫣
I’ve mixed heritage from Moāri to European 🇪🇺, which reminds me of a ever-so Poignant line from that Classic movie 🎥 Bulworth

Sana ÅLL 🫶🏾🎵🫶🏼🎶😹🙏🏾🎵🙏🏼🧭🌱🎵☂️🌅 🌊

[echols]

I grow zinnias as rabbit food and every year about this time they get crazy powdery mildew. I'm going to try the peroxide 1x a week to see if we can get his food back healthy. Once it has mildew he goes back to store bought. He's a food snob and will refuse to eat for a full day waiting on the fresh food.

[Thenoobestgirl]

I use it to keep algea out of my hydroponics' water. Works great!