[bigbadbiddy]

Yeah, it never looked that extreme, the late stage looked somewhat similar but it was more of an overall wilting and not just a single tip or spot or whatever.

Anyway:
I have recently introduced worms and top-dressed generously with EWC.
Also plugged in the heater for the night-hours.

The plants look great, it's been a week since I plucked the last lower leafs and yellow growth and I have not since seen any new yellow leafs.

The only thing remaining is the odd slightly yellow tip here or there but the last time I checked, the plants were "praying" and looked very healthy.

And I haven't even given them the malted barley tea yet...

At the current stage I believe it is safe to say that I was simply dealing with an N-deficiency due to the buckwheat hulls, maybe the EWC I bought are a bit lower in N than others etc. etc.

Everything looks really good now and I can't wait to see how they will react to a malted barley tea.

I will still read the suggested sources and continue on exploring ACTs etc. but for the moment I am glad I first tried the worms + EWC topdress. It fixed my problems.

Thank you all!

[wasgedn]

yo bigbad,
maybe thats what you looking for, act with nutes...he did aact...
i

Originally Posted by FatherEarth

Some of you are probably wondering whats in the tea.. I almost forgot, its microbemans recipe with my own adjustments:
*
https://microbeorgani...ost_Tea_Recipes
*
*
2 liters green waste compost

2liters quality earth worm castings

4 cups molasses

2 cups kelp meal

2 cups alfalfa meal

1/2 cup powdered soft rock phosphate

1/2 cup Glacial rock dust

1/2 cup pure protein dry 15-1-1

60 ml quality fish Hydrolysate( not emulsion) I use Organic Gem
*
*
So how does it smell?
*
for the first 8 hours it smelled a bit fishy, by morning when I came back in it smelled like sweet earthy goodness. The molasses takes over after the microbes get to work eating the funk.. Im certainly going to be doing more indoor brewing

check also out
https://theunconventionalfarmer.com/
its also one of the organic thread bibles...

this was mine at start
https://www.kompost-tee.de/

normal base act is always 10 liter well,rain,spring,mineral water or osmoses water ,1-2 hands ewc and 50ml organic molasses...bit rockdust and or bio char
you use what you have...no need to do it exactly like the recipes except base recipe..
i use just normal base act until 3 week flower then i add little guano but i have feeling i drive better with just adding bokashi...combinations are endless...
but fo sho no epsom salt....

cheers bro

[wasgedn]

and i am back to use terraverm not biobizz....bb is steamed....you can use it but terraverm is better...
when you got another source for ewc, pls post...

[bigbadbiddy]

I'm not using brand EWC.

I sourced a small worm farmer near me who has a setup on a small plot of land where he uses horse manure from the surrounding farms to do his EWC business.

But him and most worm farmers I saw have web pages and send their stuff everywhere.
There are huge price differences and differences in quality as well.
Hard to tell the quality for me still.

But yeah, I am staying away from any commercial brands that are sold throughout the world like biobizz etc.
Trying to get as much locally as I can.

The plants really look great btw.

Will still give them a malted barley ACT but I might keep it at that. I see no considerable deficiencies anymore. Maybe the odd yellow leaf tip or slightly light green leaf but those are the exceptions and it is still limited to lower growth which could also be due to those leafs not getting enough light since they are shaded from above.

I see no reason to tinker atm and will only add malted barley ACT because I can see no harm in it and hope it will give the plants that last "oomph" throughout the remainder of flower.

Thanks for all the feedback to everyone

[wasgedn]

But yeah, I am staying away from any commercial brands that are sold throughout the world like biobizz etc.
Trying to get as much locally as I can.

thats great...and much more fun this way...

[bigbadbiddy]

Howdy folks,

so I made my first ACT with malted barley and molasses. The plants seem to have liked it.

Quick question if someone is inclined to answer (as I am sure the answer is also hidden somewhere on microbeman's site etc.):

So I brewed the tea for 24hrs during which the airpump was running without interruption.
Is that how you guys brew as well?
Or do you put your air pump on a timer something like 5 minutes on and 5 minutes off or something?
It seemed a bit much to me to let it run without interruption for 36 hours...

I aimed for 36 hours by the way but the foam was at the verge of overspilling and no matter what I did, I couldn't keep it down. I brewed the tea until I could no longer with the foam, which was 24 hours.
Could be less foam next time if I use less molasses maybe ...

I brewed about 6-7 gallons of tea and used about 2 cups of malted barley (shredded in the blender) and a hefty blob of molasses. Must have been at least 2 tablespoons, maybe 3.


So yeah, all is good, just wondering about the brew time mostly.
36 hours is supposed to be the sweet spot but I simply couldn't brew more than 24 hrs because of the foam. I could simply brew 5 gallons next time and have more space for foam I suppose ...

And the air pump gets quite hot when running 24 hrs uninterrupted... I didn't burn my hand touching it but it was so warm, I didn't feel comfortable letting it run any longer as well.

Thoughts?

[Microbeman]

Originally Posted by bigbadbiddy

Howdy folks,

so I made my first ACT with malted barley and molasses. The plants seem to have liked it.

Quick question if someone is inclined to answer (as I am sure the answer is also hidden somewhere on microbeman's site etc.):

So I brewed the tea for 24hrs during which the airpump was running without interruption.
Is that how you guys brew as well?
Or do you put your air pump on a timer something like 5 minutes on and 5 minutes off or something?
It seemed a bit much to me to let it run without interruption for 36 hours...

I aimed for 36 hours by the way but the foam was at the verge of overspilling and no matter what I did, I couldn't keep it down. I brewed the tea until I could no longer with the foam, which was 24 hours.
Could be less foam next time if I use less molasses maybe ...

I brewed about 6-7 gallons of tea and used about 2 cups of malted barley (shredded in the blender) and a hefty blob of molasses. Must have been at least 2 tablespoons, maybe 3.


So yeah, all is good, just wondering about the brew time mostly.
36 hours is supposed to be the sweet spot but I simply couldn't brew more than 24 hrs because of the foam. I could simply brew 5 gallons next time and have more space for foam I suppose ...

And the air pump gets quite hot when running 24 hrs uninterrupted... I didn't burn my hand touching it but it was so warm, I didn't feel comfortable letting it run any longer as well.

Thoughts?

Malted barley is not an ingredient in ACT, thus the extra foaming.

[Jhhnn]

Originally Posted by h.h.

Look anything like this?
View Image

What if it does? Serious question.

[bigbadbiddy]

Originally Posted by Jhhnn

What if it does? Serious question.

He said that it would have been from root rot from overwatering.
Was trying to make sure my yellowing leafs from the bottom were not from me overwatering and causing root-rot.

@Microbeman

Hu? Damn I really need to do some reading...

The malted barley and molasses was always what peaked my interest in the ACT subject and I thought they are brewed with an airlift for 36 hours and then given to the plants to both "sweeten" the buds and increase resin production as well as overall improving the soil food web and thus plant health etc. as well. So even though there is no compost in that mix, I thought it is still considered an ACT

Enough with the questions in the dark though, I put off reading through your website long enough and will sit down this weekend and do some groundwork on the whole topic, maybe then my questions will be more sensible/to the point and actually deserve an answer

Because right now I plan to give the plants plain water for a week and then was considering a second watering with malted barley/molasses before going only water till harvest again.
And I still don't know how long I should brew it then and if it should run 24/7 for 36 hours or what.
But I bet I will find that info on your site microbeman.

Cheers all

/Edit

So I started reading on your site microbeman.
So far it seems that I didn't "brew" an ACT but an aerated tea (?) which I didn't do to feed the plants but to inoculate my soil and kickstart/support microbial population and build the living soil food web. Somewhat correct?

I also saw that malted barley wasn't mentioned anywhere (so far, what I read) on your site.
I got the whole malted barley idea from listening to Clackamas Coot on one of the KIS podcasts. I think quite highly of Coot, seeing as I run his soil mix (slightly adjusted).
The way I understood him was that a malted barley tea is in his experience by far and large the most beneficial thing you can give to plants. The way I understood him was that this is the one thing a grower shouldn't skip if they are at all, even just a little bit inclined to build an air lift and "brew teas".

From what I gathered it is, in his opinion, the thing that adds the most to the soil in terms of microbial population and strengthening/building/boosting the living soil food web.

So that's why I ended up with malted barley (and molasses as both a sweetener for the buds and a food source for the microbes to populate the aerated tea).


Now at the beginning of this thread, I thought I would add nutrients to the plants by brewing an ACT, particularly N, to combat a deficiency.
This deficiency was "solved" by topdressing generously with EWC.
So I didn't put any EWC into the tea I was brewing, as I didn't believe my soil was deficient in any more nutrients (I am coming around to think that I might need slightly more P for one pheno in my current grow in particular but overall it seems fine and yellowing/dying leafs from the bottom of the plants are all but extinct. I found a few of them and could post a pic I suppose but we are over the halfway point of flowering now and I currently believe that these yellowing leafs are normal due to not enough light being able to penetrate the canopy).

So the tea was brewed with the goal to inoculate the soil and boost the living soil food web.

If I misunderstood anything along the way, please feel free to criticize/correct me


So, now, with that out of the way, the question somewhat remains as to how long I brew and how much I mix in.

From what I understood, skimming through the first parts of your site, I probably used too much malted barley, could do with a little less molasses and could decrease brewing time to 24 hrs by preparing some EWC with crushed wheat and dilluted molasses. I suppose I could replace the wheat with malted barley, at least partially?
From what I understood, this basically "pre-cooks" the active ingredients of the tea and thus reduced brewing time to 24 hrs. Could be an option for me I suppose?

One question I did definitely not find answered but since it wasn't explicitly mentioned, I suppose the air pump is supposed to run the 36 (or 24) hours uninterrupted?

I believe I will simply try my next brew with less malted barley and molasses and maybe also put a bit less water in the bucket and see how that goes after 36 hours...

And adding EWC, kelp etc. would only be if I want to feed the plants with nutrients because they look deficient, correct?

Oh and I might add some glacial rock dust to the next brew, if I understood it right, this could be beneficial but definitely won't harm.