Tea Article

[Azeotrope]

There was some discussion on different types of seaweed/kelp here..... This last year I found the EcoNutrients N.L. (bull kelp) liquid in my area. At about $18.00 per gallon and the only thing in town these days. I was quite pleased. Similar results to the usualy sourced North Atlantic variety. What I liked is that the product is enzymatically derived/processed kind of like fish emulsion. Kind of a Kelp hydrosolate (sp?). At any rate it had no negative effect in my teas and when applied as a foliar. I was working a cross I made and is quite variable. So is my growing at times.LOL I like to play. THerefore no claims of magic here, but no signs of any losses or trouble either.

Regards. Azeo

 

[Clackamas Coot]

There was some discussion on different types of seaweed/kelp here..... This last year I found the EcoNutrients N.L. (bull kelp) liquid in my area. At about $18.00 per gallon and the only thing in town these days. I was quite pleased. Similar results to the usualy sourced North Atlantic variety. What I liked is that the product is enzymatically derived/processed kind of like fish emulsion. Kind of a Kelp hydrosolate (sp?). At any rate it had no negative effect in my teas and when applied as a foliar. I was working a cross I made and is quite variable. So is my growing at times.LOL I like to play. THerefore no claims of magic here, but no signs of any losses or trouble either.

Regards. Azeo

Azeo

I bought the Eco-Nutrient Kelp product as well as their Eco-Fish (fish hydrolysate) when they were introduced a bit over a year ago up here. I like both products.

Right now both of these products are the only liquid kelp and fish hydrolysate available at the 2 organic farm stores in Portland and their customers must be pleased as they sell quite a bit of both products.

CC

 

[heady blunts]

i am very excited to get my ACT on using my gorgeous worm castings. was in bit of a financial rut lately, but finally am ready to go get an air pump and begin brewing! just had to share my excitement.

 

[CT Guy]

i am very excited to get my ACT on using my gorgeous worm castings. was in bit of a financial rut lately, but finally am ready to go get an air pump and begin brewing! just had to share my excitement.

Glad to hear it! Good luck and feel free to post your findings or any questions along the way!

 

[Sourbear]

175+ microbes? They're joking, right? Anyone that says that in their marketing literature doesn't know much about EWC!

The guy at the hydro store said it not on the bag =/


Besides criticizing something somebody said
could you please criticize my flowering tea?
I need to know if it is a complete tea, or if their is anything else I could add to help budding.

Much appreciated

 

[Sourbear]

oh yea well my EWC have a few billion microbes.

....*sigh* thanks

 

[Microbeman]

The guy at the hydro store said it not on the bag =/


Besides criticizing something somebody said
could you please criticize my flowering tea?
I need to know if it is a complete tea, or if their is anything else I could add to help budding.

Much appreciated

Okay. Here's the thing. When you are brewing compost tea you are extracting and multiplying microbes....period. You are not tweaking with a particular nutrient to comply with a certain stage of the plant's life. When you apply the compost tea(CT) the microbes which are functional and are required by the plant/soil system remain functional, (while others go dormant). Therefore, it makes the most sense to just brew a balanced tea through all phases of the plant's life. If you have a microscope, then you can start playing around with experimenting to see if a highly fungal or bacterial or protozoial [sic] CT produces varying/better results.

Other than that, if you buy the story that you need to top up with certain nutrients during flower then you might as well just stir them up in water and pour them on or topdress....no point going to the extra trouble of brewing over a period of time....at least that's my take on it.

 

[Sourbear]

Okay. Here's the thing. When you are brewing compost tea you are extracting and multiplying microbes....period. You are not tweaking with a particular nutrient to comply with a certain stage of the plant's life. When you apply the compost tea(CT) the microbes which are functional and are required by the plant/soil system remain functional, (while others go dormant). Therefore, it makes the most sense to just brew a balanced tea through all phases of the plant's life. If you have a microscope, then you can start playing around with experimenting to see if a highly fungal or bacterial or protozoial [sic] CT produces varying/better results.

Other than that, if you buy the story that you need to top up with certain nutrients during flower then you might as well just stir them up in water and pour them on or topdress....no point going to the extra trouble of brewing over a period of time....at least that's my take on it.

ok, now that this is all clear to me....
I just thought that adding your fertilizers to your compost tea just helps with feeding and better absorbing during flower/veg.

That and it sounds like it would be easier to just add the fertz into the tea when they need fertz.

Right now I have 40 girls all in 1 gallon pots on day 2 of flower.
Im just feeding EWC/Molasses/Seaweed Extract/Humic/Fulvic acids brewed for 48 hours.

The soil i have is amended with very small traces of fertalizer, so im going to just feed the Activation tea to them all for about a week or two then when they use whats in the soil hit them all with a guano tea.

I'm thinking this would be the best possible thing to do for me
unless some one see's an error here

Also what else can I add to my tea to extract/multiply more microbes.

 

[Microbeman]

This could be a long story which I'm not inclined to get into. If you are going to use CT I suggest researching it carefully first. Adding fertilizers to a finished CT kills/smothers aerobic microbes.

 

[grapeman]

ok, now that this is all clear to me....
I just thought that adding your fertilizers to your compost tea just helps with feeding and better absorbing during flower/veg.

That and it sounds like it would be easier to just add the fertz into the tea when they need fertz.

Right now I have 40 girls all in 1 gallon pots on day 2 of flower.
Im just feeding EWC/Molasses/Seaweed Extract/Humic/Fulvic acids brewed for 48 hours.

The soil i have is amended with very small traces of fertalizer, so im going to just feed the Activation tea to them all for about a week or two then when they use whats in the soil hit them all with a guano tea.

I'm thinking this would be the best possible thing to do for me
unless some one see's an error here

Also what else can I add to my tea to extract/multiply more microbes.

What I think folks are saying is to brew a complete tea using the advice herein (good EWC, maybe a bit of kelp meal, and plenty of air with molasses) and top-dress with your guanos. If it were me, and I were going to use manures or guanos, I'd top-dress now and rake the manure in the soil a bit, as it does take some time for those nutrients to become available. The plant will use them at the proper time.

My 2 cents.

 

[Sourbear]

Ok, under the circumstances that bat guano kills microbes
I can just brew my Activated Compost Tea and feed to my plants for microbe activity.
And add my guano as a top dress fert or a water mixed fert when the plants need to feed.

Is my basic Activated Compost Tea good?
For my 4 gallon bubbler i toss in
1 cup of EWC
8 tbs of molasses
1 tbs of Seaweed extract
1 tbs of Humic Acid
1 tbs of Fulvic acid

Im not sure on the amounts of Seaweed/Humic/fulvic I should use.


Also.... i was wondering....
If i brew a tea, then add my powedered guano in the last minuite before i water my plants, would it kill enough microbes to not be worth it? Or does the guano take time to kill the microbes.

The reason being, I dont want to topdress 50 plants every time they need it, just a simple watering with the fertz would make it easier, but if its at the cost of microbes I would say its not worth it.

 

[CT Guy]

Where did you hear that bat guano kills microbes? I don't believe that's accurate. Top dressing is perfectly acceptable though. You could always just mix it with water and apply as well, separate from the tea.

I'd add the humic and fulvic at the time of application, rather than in the brew.

 

[CT Guy]

The guy at the hydro store said it not on the bag =/


Besides criticizing something somebody said
could you please criticize my flowering tea?
I need to know if it is a complete tea, or if their is anything else I could add to help budding.

Much appreciated

I guess I didn't make my point clearly. I wouldn't use a product that advertised 175+ microbes for their EWC. That statement is so far off base with what the microbial life should be in EWC that it makes me think the manufacturers don't have a clue what they're doing.

That being said, I'll have to go back and look at your recipe, but don't think of aerated compost tea as having/needing a "veg" tea or a "flower" tea. You're adding beneficial microbes in the form of bacteria/archea, fungi, and protozoa. Period. You don't need additional phosphorus or other fertilizer additions to the tea. When you make ACT you're increasing the bio-activity and bio-mass in your soil and on the leaf surface to increase nutrient cycling.

There should be nitrogen, phosphorus, etc.... in your soil mix already. ACT just helps make these organic fertilizers and nutrients plant-accessible. It's not the same as with a chemical fert plan, where you're directly feeding the plant synthetic nutes in ionic form. In an organic system, the plant is in charge.

I believe that these organic grow and bloom formulas that they charge you so much for at the grow store are largely unnecessary. Make a good soil mix that has all the proper nutrients and minerals, and then let the plant and soil biology determine what the plant needs at any given time.

 

[Microbeman]

Where did you hear that bat guano kills microbes? I don't believe that's accurate. Top dressing is perfectly acceptable though. You could always just mix it with water and apply as well, separate from the tea.

I'd add the humic and fulvic at the time of application, rather than in the brew.

He probably got that from me. Anything added in a substantial amount to a brew at the end of a brew, especially a heavy nutrient will deplete the O2 rapidly and smother microbes. (eg. I've seen 0.005% fish hydrolysate added have this effect; about 40 to 50% reduction in active microbes)

 

[CT Guy]

He probably got that from me. Anything added in a substantial amount to a brew at the end of a brew, especially a heavy nutrient will deplete the O2 rapidly and smother microbes. (eg. I've seen 0.005% fish hydrolysate added have this effect; about 40 to 50% reduction in active microbes)

You're up early too I see (of course that doesn't surprise me!).

My understanding is that he was looking to add it in his ACT at the beginning of the brew. Have you tested guano to have the same effect as fish? I could see where this could be the case, but then I've had no issues using kelp or humates at the end of a brew cycle either.

Also a factor is that your tea is probably going to contain more active microbes, which means higher DO requirements. He's using an EWC that may or may not be good, and we know nothing of the brewer design or motor. If the microbial counts aren't as high, it may not be as much of an issue when adding ingredients at the end of the brew cycle.

I think topdressing with the guano would be the way to go if you wanted to use it. Or as a separate "nutrient tea," mixed with your kelp, etc...and then applied without a brewing cycle.

 

[jaykush]

you get more out of a top dressing with guano anyways.

 

[RipVanWeed]

Got a couple ?'s for you guys,

I'm leaving the bottles behind. I wanna build my own soils that I can supplement, and reuse. I understand that the Sunshine#4 that I use as a base is not the best for continual recycling, due to breakdown of perlite and peat. What kind of medium should I add to my recycled soil bin to help this?

I am switching to pumice rather than perlite.

My current plants show some defincencies in flower,





I've just got a hold of some Sul-Po-Mag. I'm wondering the best way to apply it and in what quanities?

I grow in 5gal. buckets, kinda like LC's #1 except I added less than reccommended amounts of additional lime, in fact just about a tsp. per gal. Charged it up with some dry mix of meals (feather, blood, bone, kelp, alfalfa) about 1 Tbl. per gal., and a sprinkle of MycoMadness. I also ammend the mix with 20% Perlite, 20% EWC.

Bout 4wks. into flowering is when this shows up, I want to be able to apply the S-P-M to my current flowering plants.

Also should I add S-P-M to my soil when I mix it, and if so, how much per gal?

Thanks in advance for any info.

Much Respect,

 

[jaykush]

every single soil mix i make is based on compost and small amounts of native soil. no need for lime because the soil/microbes do the buffering. with proper care it only gets better and better each time.

you want things that eventually break down into humus. humus is good, real good.

 

[Smoke Buddy]

This is a very good thread. I appreciate all the information!
I started using teas recently, with a little help from a friend. I am seeing great results, very healthy plants.

My question is about this compost Ive been using, I got it for my outdoor veggie garden last spring and have a good amount still sitting on the ground. It came from the local landfill where they make it from yard clippings. When I break it up a bit it looks like its got alot of fungus because its got white chalky looking streaks through the material under the surface. I put a shovel full in a container to moisten and have in the house ready for my tea. I see it developed a bit of mold or fungus and I have a feeling its a good thing.
Is this good for tea? Here's a pic.


Thanks!!!

 

[CT Guy]

This is a very good thread. I appreciate all the information!
I started using teas recently, with a little help from a friend. I am seeing great results, very healthy plants.

My question is about this compost Ive been using, I got it for my outdoor veggie garden last spring and have a good amount still sitting on the ground. It came from the local landfill where they make it from yard clippings. When I break it up a bit it looks like its got alot of fungus because its got white chalky looking streaks through the material under the surface. I put a shovel full in a container to moisten and have in the house ready for my tea. I see it developed a bit of mold or fungus and I have a feeling its a good thing.
Is this good for tea? Here's a pic.


Thanks!!!

If you're getting a white fuzzy growth on top though, I'd just mix it back in to the soil. Make sure your storing your soil in a breathable container. That means holes in the bottom and sides of the container, along with a breathable top.