Hi all. I took a break from making tea because the weather was just too dang hot to be outside in September. But now I'm going to start again and was wondering how other people apply their teas to the soil.

My method is not very effective. The wine barrel has a hose spigot at the bottom that I use to half-fill two 5 gallon buckets. They are carried to the application site and topped off with water and slowly dumped into the soil, solids and all. The worms go nuts over the solids - it's like a banana-split-brownie-sundae-festival!!! They literally dive in and on and over each other in a squirming, slithering pile of erythrogasm. (new word I just made up:8}) The solids eventually decompose into the soil - mostly compost, alfalfa and some steer manure or bat guano. And corn meal.

If I'm in a hurry or just not being careful, my pouring can leave divets or ruts in the soil. Even strained tea clogs the watering roses, so I don't use a can anymore, just the buckets.

Any ideas? Tried and true methods? I believe in you people - you've never let me down!

-nita

I'm a big compost tea fanatic as you well know! I have two 20 gallon plastic tubs hooked up to a 60 gallon aquarium air pump, running at all times through the year until it gets so cold my water freezes! (LOL)

In the hot weather, I usually use less dry molasses powder in my teas, and only brew it for 1-2 days. During cooler weather, I use more molasses, and let it brew maybe 3-4 days or longer, until it smells pleasant and looks foamy on top, in order to get good aerobic microbes growing in it.

I also keep two 50 gallon rain barrels full of faucet water, with a cup or so of compost, dirt, or urine in it. This is my nitrogen/microbial activator for my compost piles, and dilution water base for most of my aerobic tea recipes.

I love to add bacterial/fungal foods like dry molasses, corn meal, rotten fish, seaweed, rotten fruit, cattle/horse feeds, etc. to my aerated tea recipes as I feel lead to adjust it for my different crop needs.

I use my teas as both a foliar and soil drench. Sometimes diluting it from a 1:1 to 1:5 ratio. A 5 gallon tea recipe can be diluted to biostimulate an acre of plant foliage. 15 gallons of tea can biostimulate an acre of soil. 5 gallons of a good rich aerobic tea can have as many aerobic bacteria and fungi in it as over 10 tons or 40 cubic yards of regular compost!

I like to use my watering can or just a narrow plastic bottle and a 5 gallon bucket, to transport and apply teas on my plants and soil.

I never strain my teas any more with pantyhose, burlap, pillow cases, laundry bags, etc. Any filter you can use will let the liquid juice and bacteria flow through, but it will block out all the beneficial fungi and other larger microbes and macrobes growing in my teas. So now I just put all my ingredients in my homemade brewers, then scoop out the large remains and put them back in my compost piles, while putting most of the juice and tiny pieces in my watering can or bottle, for application to the garden.

cAPTAIN COMPOST, b

Captain Compost,I am doing this e-mail form a tain stationin Sevvile Spain. Instead of using compost tea, guess I am lazy, I just place some large pieces of Llama poo in a 5 gallom bucket, fill it with water and let it sit until I use it. I will add fish fertilizer TO THE MIXTURE and ladle it nto the plants. I use 0-0-10 mixed with the manure tea for fruit bearing plants.
What44s your opinion on my method. I will check in when I ge to Madrid.

That's perfectly fine! Any non-aerated organic tea made from nitrogen materials and water is an excellent liquid fertilizer. However, unless you have constant aeration in the liquid, add at least a biostimulant like sugar or dry molasses, you will not generate and breed the correct balance, and species of beneficial aerobic bacteria, fungi, and actinomycetes necessary to propel your teas from being a mere liquid fertilizer, to becoming a powerful biostimulant, capable of build soil, reducing diseases, build plant immunities, speeding up foliar and root nutrients uptake, and increasing the powers of your mulches and composting.

I also use my tea from a five gal. bucket. I just put holes in a big coffee can and dip from the bucket. The holes are big enough that they don't plug up easily and if they do, I just bang the can on the rim of the bucket and dip again. The holes in the can don't cause any runoff- works good for me.

owl

I make my tea in a five gallon bucket with an aquarium pump to aerate it. When its done, I decant the liquid into another 5 gallon bucket. I then pour some of the tea into a 2 gallon garden sprayer and dilute it from 1:1 to 1:4 with dechlorinated H20. I then foliar feed my trees, shrubs, lawn, and garden veggies. The solids left in the bucket then get spread into the garden and turned under.

My question is: [i]does the sprayer rough up the fungi and larger molecules?[i] I assume the sprayer is OK, otherwise how would users foliar feed large areas.