How To Brew Compost Tea for Best Results
Compost tea is an excellent source of nutrients for your plants. You can use it to water the soil, or use it as a foliar spray on the plants themselves.
There are a few things you'll need to brew compost tea.
The most important item is a very good compost.
If you don't make your own, you'll have to buy some at the local garden center.
If you do make your own compost, it should be completely aged and smelling good.
Use 1-2 pounds (.5-1 kg) of compost per 5 gallons (19 liters) of water.
The other equipment and supplies include:
- unchlorinated water (well water or 1 hour aeration of city water)
- a pump
- several feet of air tubing
- a gang valve (distributes the air)
- three bubblers (air stones)
- two 5-gallon (19 liter) plastic buckets
- stirrer, like a wooden paint stirrer
- straining material such as nylon stocking or mesh cloth
- liquid organic molasses
- hand pump sprayer
- 1 ounce (28 ml) of molasses
- A mesh packet containing some compost, along with oatmeal, kelp, fish hydrolysate and bran
Warnings
Do not brew compost tea without aerating it. It could harm your plants if you don't aerate it.
Also, if the tea is not aerated constantly, the organisms in it will quickly use up the oxygen. The tea will then start to stink and become anaerobic as the aerobic microorganisms die and the anaerobic ones take over.
Use the compost tea immediately.
Have all of the equipment and supplies? Let's get started!
Brewing Your Compost Tea
- Cut a desired length of tubing, attach one end to the pump and the other to the gang valve.
- Cut three more lengths of tubing that are long enough to reach from the rim to the bottom of the bucket.
- Connect each one to a outlet on the gang valve and push a bubbler into the other end.
- Hang the gang valve on the lip of the bucket and bury the bubblers at the bottom of the bucket under the compost.
- Fill the bucket half full of loose compost.
- Fill the bucket to within 3 inches (7.5 cm) of the rim with water, stir, and start the pump.
- When it's going, add the molasses, then stir vigorously with the stick. The molasses feeds the bacteria and gets them growing well.
- Place the mesh packet in the pail. These foods allow fungi to grow. Remove the compost packet after 6 to 8 hours and continue to aerate the compost tea.
- After stirring, you'll need to make sure the bubblers are on the bottom of the bucket and well spaced.
- Try to stir the tea at least three times a day. A vigorous mixing with the stick gets more organisms loose and into the tea.
- Every time you stir, be sure to reposition the bubblers.
- If a lot of foam is produced, add several drops of vegetable oil.
After three days...
- The brewing process will be finished after 24 to 36 hours. Turn off the pump and remove the equipment. If you aerate longer than three days, you must add more molasses.
- Let the brew sit until the compost is pretty much settled out, no more than 10 to 20 minutes, then strain it into the other bucket or directly into your sprayer. You'll have about 2 1/2 gallons (9.5 liters) of tea.
- Use the tea right away, within the hour if possible.
- If you want to add mycorrhizal fungi, organic liquid fertilizer or Super Thrive to your brew, do so after brewing and right before applying the brew compost tea.
Always clean your equipment when you're done to stop the build-up of bio-films that contain anaerobic organisms and E coli.
Brew compost tea twice a year, once in the spring and again in the early fall. If you have lots of pests, then make it twice a month during the growing season until you see that the bad guys are gone. Healthy plants ward off harmful bugs.
Application of Compost Tea
- For a foliar spray, apply 2 quarts per 4,000 square feet, 5 gallons per acre (48 liters per hectare).
- For a soil drench, use at the rate of 20 gallons per acre (190 liters per hectare).
- Do not apply between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m.
- Apply to a moistened soil, never to a dry soil.
- To increase soil microbial activity, apply every 1 to 2 weeks for a few weeks, then as little as 2 to 3 times a year.
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