Organic Aerated Teas are the most effective way to feed your plant in any medium. Incredibly dense beneficial aerobic bacterial cultures will provide your plants with nutrients and protect them.

Since I noticed there was very little going on on UK420 'organic tea-wize', I started this thread to shine the light on this superb, simple and safe method of feeding your plants.

Lets git to tha point!

What you need
* Container
* Water
* Aerating device (pump/powerhead/airtone)
* Food source (minerals/vitamines/sugars)
* Bacteria source
* 24h

For instance a bucket, powerhead, compost or worm castings, molasses and seaweed. Aerate for 24 hours, or until you see foam on top. Water plants as usual.

First of all you need nutrients for the plants; your basic organic blood meal, composts, guanos, seaweed extracts and organic nutrient products work really well in a tea. Mineral nutrients can be used, too, but at lowered dilutions. You cant really make tea out of bone meals, unless really finely pulverized.

This is a very short list of stuff that can provide the bacteria your tea:
Worm castings
Composts
Fermented drinks - yoghurt, beer, natto
Yeast - bakers or brewers

Of course you may need food for the micro-organisms: minerals, sugars (glucose, starch), vitamines and/or amino acids, in order of importance. Usually something like one thousandth is enough.
molasses
seaweed and kelp
corn or potato starch
white sugar
wheat, rye or rice bran
fruit or vegetable pulp and juices
gelatine

For adjusting the pH, if thats something you really need to do, you can use lemon juice, citric acid or white and apple cider vinegar as pH- and small amounts of baking powder, clay or silicate powders etc as pH+

My tea-brew-in-gadget has a aquarium water pump inside 4-5 old cotton socks and a grannies nylon stocking on top which act as a super sophisticated filter. Then above the surface theres a sprayline with few dozen jets spraying the water surface for max oxygen.

Here are some articles for anyone new to compost teas or to the concept - copypaste into your url box
Brewing Compost tea - http://www.taunton.com/finegardening/pages/g00030.asp *first I ever read
Understanding compost tea - http://www.jgpress.com/BCArticles/2000/100071.html
What is Compost Tea http://www.soilfoodweb.com.au/index.php?pageid=335
Bug juice - http://grouppekurosawa.com/organic1print.htm
Bacterial basics - http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/bacteria/bacterialh.html

and heres why to eat flax seed (kills cancer cells) http://www.grouppekurosawa.com/nutrition.htm
But that has nothing to do with compost tea!

How many time it takes to brew the tea?
And for using in longer periods of time, should it be air bubbled all that time? Or can we store it after beeing brewed?

Hmm.. this isnt written clearly enough? and I quote myself



Once you see it forming a foam or other signs of vigorous bacterial activity, its ready to use.

As for storing, I wouldn't. Would you make tea and drink it week later? Hehe never really stored the stuff..

Any other Compost Tea Fiends here to share their experience?

Thank you funky worm.

I like the idea and want to give it a go. Having read the links i have a question you may be able to answer.

When would you add it to MJ? I'm worried that i may burn young veging plants.

I'm thinking that the tea contains compost and water (fine so far) but we then need to add a food source (like sugar molases, 1Fl oz per 5 gallons, i have 3 branded ferts based on this ingtredient).

So i am thinking that after 3 days of bubbling i'll have a lovely soup of microbal activity but will it also be high in ferts that could potentially burn my seedlings?

any advice would be appreciated.

If you follow the recommendations on those linked compost tea guides, and properly prepare the potent potion, I doubt you will have any problems with young plants.

I would always use compost tea for feeding MJ, if in doubt give diluted tea for young plants (but dont starve em). You will see the plants exploding with vigor once you get your tea right imho.

Compost tea works great not because its strong, but because the density of microbe life, so a burn isn't an issue imo, although you *can* make tea thats too strong for seedlings.

You could even 'activate' your 'bottled fert' biobizzes or whatever by bubbling em with low amounts of compost/castings and molasses or similar carb source for 24h or so! Only diff between aerated compost tea and 'branded ferts' is the MICRO LIFE, and it makes for a world of difference.

Compost tea may have 6 billion bacteria per gram.

BTW 3 days of bubbling sounds to me like kinda long time, you should see foaming etc in one day or so, I guess this depends partially on temperature, amount of air pumped into the solution and ingredients tho.

More compost tea links from attra.org (the slides in first link even have a lavender trich shot!)
http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/composttea...ides/sld001.htm
http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/compost-tea-notes.html

Yet another nice compost tea article
http://www.npr.org/programs/talkingplants/...s/2002/compost/

organic tea...mmmmm

so if i have this right you need bacteria (wormcasts or similar) and something for them to nosh on (sugary fruity stuff) and the the nutrients themselves ....right?

are the nutrients going in the tea along with the bacteria and the sugars? ,or are they present in the growing medium? ...or doesnt it matter as long as they are available.

i make my own bread sometimes so i've been spotted in warm areas of the house retrieving a foaming jug that has been prepared earlier from yeast water and sugar ...this makes nice bread but could i also syphon off a little and make up an organice tea with his mix?

cf

Thank you funky worm,

I'm going to try a tea made from mushroom compost and a little bat guano and i'll feed the micro life in the bubbler with honey or golden syrup (i'll save the molasses based fertalizer feed until the plants are bigger).

Thank you

cf:

Exactamundo! Hetetetete hetete tetete-etete - Scorchio!

In fact not only bacteria, but yeasts and fungi are in this party, too - microbes!
lemme try to put it more accurately in another words

* Microbe source - bacteria and fungi from compost, worm castings, yeasts..
* Carbohydrates - microbe food: molasses, apple juice, corn starch, sugar...
* Mineral nutrients - plant and microbe food: NPK macro and micronutrients


Nutrients need to be in the tea, imho, at least some, otoh compost & castings always do contain some mineral nutrients. Microbe life will absorb (some of) the nutrients and make more complex bio-molecyles...

If you've made 'real' bread with yeast, you already understand how to 'grow microbes'.

Now bread yeast-starter alone probably isnt optimal for plant root zone health but I believe you could try bubbling it after adding some composts and would come up with nice plant tea.

Fishy - NP, just passing on what I think is the greatest tech since I learned hydroponics! Tea puts the punch of 'ponics in 'Ganics!

^^^