Six Uses for Tea Bags

A used tea bag can be used to give a little more flavor to dinner by using it to marinade meat and give it a savory taste. Just mix with the marinade for adding a bit of flair to your dish.

Tea helps to speed up the decomposition process of organic matter. For non-biodegradable tea bags, you can slit them open and use the moist tea leaves in your compost.

Roses love it, and so do houseplants and garden plants like ferns; tea makes a nutrient rich fertilizer with its tannic acid and nitrogen-boosting properties. To use as a fertilizer, you can brew up some tea or mix damp black tea leaves into the soil or spread it around the base of plants.
Bug bites and stings can be treated by using a cooled tea bag as a compress to relieve itching, sting, and inflammation.


With poison ivy or sunburn, you can either use the compress method, or make tea to add to lukewarm water in a bath and soak up its healing properties.

Rodents and cats do not like the smell and bugs and slugs can be kept at bay with some tea leaves sprinkled into the soil. Use dry tea leaves or a moist bag that’s been cut open. It is thought that the caffeine can keep pests from eating or urinating on your garden.

Origin of Tea Bags

In 1904, tea bags were invented accidentally. The inventor was a tea merchant named Thomas Sullivan. He decided that it was cheaper to send small samples to prospective customers in silk bags, rather than boxes. The recipients mistakenly believed they were meant to be dunked and Sullivan was overrun with orders for his tea bags.