Soil & Fertilizer: Compost Tea

Great stuff, I'm gonna try this.
Does it matter what time of year you use this on your plants or ground.
Was thinking of preping an area for spring planting ...... which here in Fl is very soon. We are still going to have some cold nights will this affect the compost tea spread on the ground?

Hey, you found the thread huh? lol

I'm pretty sure you'll have no problem applying this any time of year. Since it is not a "blooming" type fertilizer, it should work fine. This tea gives your plants food to live and adds microbes to your soil. Let us know how your doing with it. :-)

Donna

I'm glad you found this thread and bumped it up. I like to read it :)

So cal going out to get the stuff to make the tea ,
any suggestions on what compost to use?

Whats best or best mix?

TY

Can't help you with what type of compost to use, as I use my own homemade stuff. If your going to a reputable nursery, ask them and tell them what your going to do with it.

Donna

I buy Gardener's Gold from Gardens Alive.

Thanks Twin

You are welcome

bump!

Bump

This is a pretty good discussion with but a few little matters that may help you understand the purpose and make up of aerobic tea.

One simple fact....you are expanding the entire mycro-herd that is your living compost. At the very best that will be all kinds of bacteria, fungi and critters from amoeba to nematodes. Of course if any of these elements are not in your compost it can not be expanded. The aerobic part supplys the oxygen for this expansion. I find the best temperature to be seventy six degrees. There should be no NPK in properly finished aerobic tea. The basic minerals and trace minerals will ride along in minor amounts but can not be expanded. They are insignificant in the process.

I suggest you purchase compost of proven quality made specifically for aerobic tea. One source is North Country Organics. From this high quality base you can innoculate your garden and compost piles. Your piles after you use just one bag will then contain a complete mycro-herd from which your local compost will then equal or better the purchased compost.

The value of aerobic tea is two fold. One the living biology will when properly placed occupy and continue exansion on your living plants thereby leaving no space for the bad guys to get a foothold. Secondly and more important the mycro-herd goes to work converting the organic matter in your soil to compost, humus, humic acids and beyond before your plants can ingest them.

Every maker's tea will be somewhat different than everyone else's tea. It is not rocket science. I have only hoped to help you understand the aerobic tea basics.

If you enter into this world of letting the health of your soil up to the aerobic tea process it makes absolutely no sense at all to use manufactred fertilizer because they will hurt or actually kill the very biology you are attempting to build. You would also think accordingly about synthetic manufactured herbacides, insecticided and fungicides.

You are all to be complimented. Keep working at it as you can. Expect immediate results at the lower levels or during even the first year. After three years of trusting your system of organic building you will see astonishing improvements in appearance as well as shape and quality of food items you may grow. Expect change while trusting your system.

After four year of trusting and building my soil with aerobic teas and organic fertilizers my giant pumpkins have increased a minimum of fifty pounds a year. While not earth shaking I have moved from 400 lbs to 763 lbs and we are not done improving. The world record is twice my success and more. The last five world record pumpkins have been growen in healthy soil heavily into the organic principles. The principals are learning.

My giant long gourds moved from forty four inches to ninety eight inches long.

My what an impressive gourd you have, docgipe!

Amazing results!

Beautiful gourd, Docgipe! Ya done good!!

Shoe

Docgipe, thanks for the picture, and for the encouragement. I have a pile that is 2 years old, but I've never turned it. It's made totally of leaves, and it has NOT broken down. I am going to try using your instruction.

I didn't like having to strain my aerated compost tea after it was finished, and the burlap sacks holes were too big, the cheese cloth too flimsy and the panty hose too small, so I made a bag out of a 25 inch square of fine tulle mesh fabric, and it works great.
When you are done, just pull the bag out and it is already filtered.
The materials in the bag i use to mulch plants that need it.
Josephine.

frost, I'll send you a pair of MY pantyhose, it won't be too small, haha!

Funny!! Cathy4, but really you should try it, it is a lot easier than the panty hose and it can be reused.

Frost, I just happen to have some nice pink tulle from the wedding my daughter cancelled at the last minute (thank goodness!). I'm sure the neighbors will add that to the list of crazy things I do in the yard, haha.

The attached Christmas Flower just could not wait for Christmas. Raised on various teas and fed the waste that the tea came from.

Beautiful!!!!

docgipe,
My question is, What do you do with a 763 lb. pumpkin or a 90" gourd?

Good question, Zany! :)

You brag about it to your friends, and then show them at the state fair,right?

Are they edible?

OK...............I have grown half a dozen giant pumpkins. Those that saw fit to finish healthy made it to the sculpting table with some sort of a charity benefit tied into the activity. After carving and sculpting they last about two weeks after which the are in my case returned to the compost pile. Mostly I want to keep the seed to barter with. As someone mentioned....I want the bragging rights too. :)

Like many huge things giant pumkins make good food for cows. If grown in healthy soil they are fine to eat but if one wants to eat pumpkin I certainly do suggest "LIBYS" or pie pumpkins from seed with proven quality to be eaten.

The gourds harden in the drying process. There is no real use for long gourds that is anything short of nuts. One friend of mine put one to a bandsaw after which he built a gourd spouting for his garden shed. Other gourds make bird houses, bowls, spoons, dippers and even musical instruments. In the hands of a good artist they may carry very interesting burned, stained and carved designs. There is quite an industry wrapped around the gourds.

Most competitive growers go to a once a year weigh off which is an independant gathering of giant growers where a certified scale is the crier of all truths or the tape measure measures the real measurements. There are regional weigh offs all tied together by computer so that over about three weeks each years records are posted on the parent organization web site. This is an international organization. The computer has brought most of us all together. We have a saying, " the BS stops when the tail gate drops".

There is an international gathering at Niagra Falls Canada side each spring. The best of the best and anyone with the bucks goes to kick up the heels and jaw bone with the best growers in the world. An Orange Jacket goes to the record pumpkin weight of the year while a Green Jacket goes to the record squash grower of the year. These are extreme quality tailored to the winner jackets. After a few long neckers the records tend to get a bit twisted................but this is the kick off of a new season. Those twisted reports and projections are just grower estimates for the new year. :)

The major cash prize distribution happens at the regional weigh offs. From one to three thousand bucks or more goes to the largest pumpkin. They pay out ten deep for Pumpkins, Squash, Tomatoes, Long Gourd, Onions Watermellon and each have a few categories that others do not honor. These weigh offs are sometimes followed....next day by a pumpkin regatta on the local lake or river. Again there are regional prizes, cash and trophy related to the regatta. There are two categories....paddle power and motorized. These events are growing into an absolute riot.

Wives and girl friends often come up with creative clothing for these events. Note my low ego smock.

What fun! I know that gourds are used by crafters and artists but a 90" gourd might make an interesting rain spout at that!

I know some farmers used to grow pumpkins on their fields just to have for the local markets during halloween and thanksgiving and to plow the rest of them under to improve the soil.

It sure looks like you guys have a lot of fun.

HEY.........GUYS AND GALS!!! Pennsylvania and Oregon or Washington have female world champions from days gone by. Lots of gals attempt to grow the elusive 2000 lb. one ton pumpkin. Lots of bucks out there for the first one tone pumpkin.

LOL A 1 ton pumpkin would be about twice the size of my entire gardening space and my patio combined! Think I'll have to leave that to someone with the space for it!

absolutely fascinating thread. Docgipe: is there suggested reading on the aerobic tea process by the guy who grows pumpkins the size of my garden shed? How inspiring all this is. thanks "A TON". ~ shawna

After reading about compost tea and all it's benefits I am left puzzled and perplexed.

I believe it works and the people here that use it are terrific for sharing their personal experiences and experiments with us BUT... I am still confused! ( unfortunately this is normal for me)

In composting we are told to keep our piles damply wet to encourage Aerobic Microbes but not too wet to discourage Anaerobic Microbes. By putting the compost into a tea aren't we doing just the opposite, killing aerobics and encouraging anaerobics. And aren't the anerobics the ones that sour the soil and cause root fungus and rot?

I have been thinking about it and am confusing myself more and more. My Darlin' keeps telling me to knock it off but this goofy brain just won't let it go!

So, can anyone explain this in a compost tea for dummies format?

Zany, a wise woman once told me this when I kept trying to understand how something worked that seemed illogical: Accept! Accept! (said in a good whitch Glenda voice while waving the magic wand)

LOL I can accept it on faith but it still confuses me.

Zanymuse, that is the reason that we put the air in to make aerobic, I guess you forgot about the air being pumped in, that is why it is called aerated compost tea.
Josephine.

For those that may be confused. That's about normal because tea terms seem to be badly mixed and mis-used.
......Here is my effort at Teas 101. I will use as much KISMIF as is possible. "Keep It Simple Make It Fun"

Let us begin in the cold of the winter when the early cave men took as few steps away from the cave entrance to relieve themselves as was the practice of the day. Later in the early spring they could not help but notice the plants in and near that spot grew super good. Those who had boss women walked a bit further into the woods. Their discovery was a spot here and a spot there with better than average spring plant growth. As they grew out of the hunter stage into the planter stages they began saving all animal manures including their own. It became the talk of the early man that the lazy ones with less or no manures in their soil grew smaller and less tasty plants and fruits and nuts. Getting right down to the facts that was the first known example of 14% nitrogen "Pee Tea".

Befor you laugh the lazy ones discovered that few or no weeds grew through their piles of plant materials so they became the first mulchers. In grunting but clear language they discovered that mulch remains mulch until it becomes soil (they knew nothing of a term called compost) We know if something rots and converts in or into the soil all the following growth from that spot will be better than any previous growth. The biology of the soil and the plant itself turns all into some form of compost. There is always a mini compost pile even under a single leaf and the soil contains the biology to cause it to rot and become compost.

Mother nature give us water or we use her stored supply to bring about dilution of any tea or the creation of aerobic tea.

From this you may safely deduct that tea can be made from anything that once lived. Termology helps if we say we made manure tea, onion and comfrey tea and such. That way the reader understands where you are coming from. I know of no plant that can not be used. I hope you understand that the use of poison ivy plant material may not be a good idea. It will however rot and cares not that you hosted it for awhile along the way. Once completely converted to humus there is excellent ballance where the good guys rule the biology.

The natural progression from living "anything" including animals is conversion by biology in the soil or compost pile is using oxygen and water to creat rot. Humus is the second stage of conversion followd by humic acid still being created by your biology and even more breakdown
before our new plant life can uptake the nutrients into new growth and fruit or nuts. We say a compost pile is finished when there are no pieces large enough to determine from where it came.

Good compost when started should contain manures, trace minerals, living and dead plants plus a small amount of your soil to innoculate your pile with the biology of your native soil. When this pile converts to humis you have the good stuff.

Excellent compost tea can be made only by using excellent compost. You have heard the phrase...can't get blood out of a turnip ! This is so true.

It is important to understand that all matter in all compost would have converted where it fell to mother earth with or without your help. You get a tea quality in direct relationship to your skill at developing finished compost.
This tea or tea anywhere along the way is good. The point is we generally want the best for our use faster!
There is nothing wrong with any tea from any source. We have however learned that the tea gets better as it is made with better and further converted plant material we call compost.

So what is this aeroboic tea process. Simply take finished compost and pump your water up to the saturation point with oxygen at seventy six degrees. This enables the biology to expand by tens, hundreds or thousand folds the basic life found in your compost. There is no NPK in well made aerobic tea. You are greatly increasing your living biology which now does not have to be developed in your soil. You dump it into your soil where it immediately goes to work converting your organic content and humus into that which is ready for the growing plant to use.

The only way you can see this happen is to have two thousand or so bucks in a scope. There you could see the living bacteria, fungi and critters from amoeba to neematodes. Without the scope...like most of us you have to look at your garden results and gunt to your friends...."umph plant there good".

Hey there are writers who can dump a bunch of fancy words some don't even understand. They hate to admit it but they too are just a few steps away from the cave door. Some of those writers pee off the end of the patio deck. Many of them have not re-discovered...."grumph good there". Yet the tell us how to poison the very biology we need to improve our soils.

Organic principles are now everywhere on the net. Google will keep any interested person busy up to their last breath. Speaking of the last breath....the biology will clean up that once living matter too. It shall come to pass with or without any fancy words for the process.

Excellent explanation Docgipe!! I didn't have time to get into that much length when i posted, but you did a great job, thank you very much.

that is the most beautiful story I ever heard.

a humble thank you, zen compost master. wow.

Thanks for the added info. This old cavewoman is still in the grunting stage for certain ;~)