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Got Milk?
- Thread starter sunnydog
- Start date
Tactical Farmer
Member
Im interested also, used some Galigers 1% diluted on my house plants not very long ago, fungus knats moved in right away & now all plants are infested with the bastards.
Made the soil smell like spoiled milk.
Made the soil smell like spoiled milk.
sunnydogWith the many benefits attributed to lacto bacilli, does anybody use milk/milk products in teas,compost soil, etc?
I have a bag of dried skim milk I want to use, just not sure of the best way.
SD
The lacto mother culture that many people use is EM-1 which is said to contain several lacto strains. Several months ago I looked at a site in New Zealand that was the official retailer of EM-1 and it listed the various strains.
I diligently looked them up and one of them (name I don't recall) is the very same strain used to make the Belgian Lambic wheat beer. Most beers around the world are brewed using Brewer's Yeast but Lambic beer is brewed using wild yeasts (beneficial indigenous microbes) and bacteria that are said to be native to the Senne Valley.
This specific strain is also the strain used in Bulgarian-style yogurt as well as Greek-style yogurt.
I'm not saying that it's a good thing to apply yogurt or beer to your garden's soil but there's more in common that one would think.
Sorry for the rambling! LOL
CC
Using something like diluted Kefir as a plant feed sounds magical.
dried milk can be lightly dusted as a top dressing, or mixed in with a ewc slurry. milk can be diluted ( down to about 5% total volume) and applied either as a foliar as mentioned above or as a soil drench. its good stuff. but best used in low ratios.
Thanks!
Is lacto b what gives us the benefits in using milk or is it lactic acid or some combonation of everything else in milk? For instance would a lacto b addition be as effective as whole milk? Or would the aminos, acids, proteins and what not in milk be better? scrappy
well scrappy if you make the lacto b culture, it is much more concentrated than the lacto b in milk. as far as organisms go you will get more benefits from the lacto b culture. that being said i believe all the other goodies in milk like you mentioned also have beneficial effects. i know there are now some dairy farmers who sacrifice some of the milk they produce to spray there pastures with it. they say it increases the growth,health and nutrition of the plants and soil in the pasture MANY times. whenever my neighbor has extra milk from his cow that has gone a little south he gives it to me for spraying on the garden. a few days after the spray the plants are always nice and healthy and imo have a waxier outer leaf which imo deters pests.
I was hoping the milk sugar( Lactose) would provide proper nutrition for any existing lactic bacteria, as well as proteins and amino acids.
are plants capable of utilizing the various constituents of milk? the amino acids, the vitamins, the proteins, etc.?
could use some knowledge in this area....anyone?
we're really trying to feed the microbes in the soil, as the exudates from their metabolism is what our roots absorb as food. They do not absorb nutrients as is, the nutrients are converted to waste and that waste is absorbed for use(by the roots).
this is MY understanding of this process...if anyone has a better grasp of the facts, I'd like to hear from you!
could use some knowledge in this area....anyone?
we're really trying to feed the microbes in the soil, as the exudates from their metabolism is what our roots absorb as food. They do not absorb nutrients as is, the nutrients are converted to waste and that waste is absorbed for use(by the roots).
this is MY understanding of this process...if anyone has a better grasp of the facts, I'd like to hear from you!
mostnonymouse
Member
I've heard of farmers spreading raw milk on their pastures @ 3 gallon per acre. You can dilute that into a 20 gallon solution. I don't believe any benefits were gained over the 3gpa threshold.
