I haven't seen a thread started for some good ole compost tea and since its grown in popularity and its mainly the only thing I use, I thought a topic discussing recipes, useage, methods of making and other uses for it would be a good addition.
Im an amateur at best, but since it's free so I will learn. I make two kinds the first probally the most basic...just stewed compost in a 20 gallon rain water barrel for about 24hrs or overnight, then depending on how frequent I've used in the past couple weeks I either strain it to avoid clogging my water jug and pour it around the plants, or after straining I dilute it 50/50 with rain water then once a week use it just as I would when I regularly water. So far for my experience it has worked great.
The second is by far my favorite and at the same time the worst (but still good) to make. It's messy, it stinks, stains and like an amateur as myself hard to determine that your growing the right stuff, your basically creating a nursery to grow living organisms that will be transferred to your soil to help your plants suck up the available nutrients and moisture via watering. Or, that is at best, my take on it and im sure there is more complicated ways than I'd like dive into too but that is my understanding.
Anyway here's my recipe and a sneak peak of a project im venturing into...Basically mine is just a simple a recipe to get me informed and understand it more, I use a 5 gallon bucket that idrill a hole and epoxied a airtube and diffufuser through (to conserve space), decent size air pump with a 3 way converter. My mix is just two scoops of compost (made from our and scrapes) one scoop of worm castings in a paint strainer or cloth bag, 1/4 cup of seaweed or kelp extract, 1/4 cup of black strap molasses is mix in the water to feed the micro organisms and bacteria. I place a air stone in the bag of compost and castings, one towards the opposite side and then the permanent line in the bottom. Hook it to decent air supply and let it brew for 24-36 hrs. I mix it 50-50 with rain water and pour as usual. There are many better and more effective ways to make this, hooefully soon we will get a good microscope so we can see what we are really growing, thats the only definite way to determine.
Now before this turns into a short novel, my little project. Its a giant magnetic stirrer using a d.c. motor, basic d.c. motor controller witha potentiometer to control the speed, a fly wheel with four neodymium magnets and a four inch magnetic stirrer. Hopefully since air is the only way to circulate and keep the water moving to grow aerobic bacteria and not anaerobic, and a water pump is to violent, I had a grand idea that a giant magnetic stirrer would keep the water at a constant motion and circulate the diffused air more and mabye more evenly through the water. What do you think plausible or just ridiculous lol....here is a pic of the stand and setup im temporarily using
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