Like I needed any help. Here's my story. All this talk about compost tea and I just couldn't resist. First it was compost bins, then seeds,then stuff to make bean trellises and now all the makings for a compost tea brewer. You know us poor old retired sailors don't have bottomless pockets! And I still plan on a new freezer for this years crop. In actuality the point of these musings is to get an opinion of how large a container I should use for the tea. Seems like a 5 gallon bucket wouldn't go very far. I was thinking more along the lines of a 20 or 32 gallon trash can. Everything I've read says to soak the soil. Not going to do much soaking with 5 gallons. And lastly, where do you buy molasses (w/o sulfur)?

As always,
Dirt

You're so funny, my friend! (LOL)

A 5 gallon brewed ACT (aerated compost tea) recipe is recommended to biostimulate an acre of plants on an acre of soil via foliar mist spraying. (NOTE: using a 1:1 to 1:5 dilution ratio with rainwater or any other form of dechlorinated water or tea)

A 15 gallon brewed ACT recipe is recommended to biostimulate an acre of soil as a soil drench, assuming from a 1:1 to 1:5 dilution ratio.

As you may know, or may have seen from my website, I use a couple of cheap 20 gallon plastic tubs, hooked up to a dual hosed aquarium air pump, designed for a 60 gallon fish tank. You don't have to use that big of a tub or pump. My pump costed about $25.00 from a local pet shop. I believe Wal-Mart has them too.

I also keep unaerated diluted tea in several 50 gallon rain barrels. It is usually used for activating and speeding decomposition in my compost stockpiles.

I found a cheap 50 lb bag of dry molasses at the farm feed store for $10.00. I found a $6.00 gallon jug of farm feed molasses at the same store. Brown sugar and corn syrups work too as bacterial foods. Rotten sweet fruits are great fungal foods. A few tblsp per gallon of tea is all you really need for a 1-3 day ACT brew.


Hope this helps, my man!
Happy Gardening!

I just use 5 gal. buckets, made plenty of tea for my needs by the time it was diluted.

I am the queen of cheap...it has been said I'm so cheap I squeak when I walk....hey, why spend a bundle when ordinary everyday items will do the job. I even make my own birdbaths out of a log set on end and an old planter bottom nailed to the top of it. Works great. Doesn't even leak.

You should meet my best man, he's the King of Cheap. His wallet is full of cobwebs.

Dirt

DH and I FINALLY drilled a hole in the bottom half of the wine barrel I've been using for tea brewing. It's a 60 gallon french oak (chi chi) bucket I got for cheap. I couldn't find any free bungs to stop the hole mid-way up the sides, so I was just using the bottom half with an aquarium pump.

A trip to HD later, I got a metal faucet, a handful of rubber and metal washers, a metal nipple and a sturdy coupling to keep it all from washing into my bucket when I collect tea. AND I got a free flexible bung from a winery friend. yay!!

When the tea's gone I'll empty the solids via the bunghole into one of the composts. The only problem is that I need to figure out an effective way to screen out the solids from the interior faucet pipe so the faucet doesn't clog. Any screen ideas???

You don't have to throw it in. I put mine in an old sock and tie it off with hay string and hang it in. I will check it at least twice a day and squeeze it. I had great results. That way I don't worry about straining. When I'm finished with that batch, I toss it back in the compost pile. I too use a 5 gallon bucket and 50 gallon aretor for mine.

Why would you want the molassas without sulfur?

Using socks, pantyhose, burlap sacks, pillow cases, etc. are definitely the cleanest and easier ways to handle your ingredients for compost brewing. After your tea is done, you discard the remains back into your compost pile or on the garden as a soil amendment.

However, recent research proves that cheap compost tea filters like discussed above, filter out too many of your beneficial microbes from your tea. All bacteria forms are the smaller microbes. They can flow fine though filters into your tea for application. However, larger microbes like fungi, actinomycetes, protozoa, etc. can't get through a filter. So you end up throwing all those good microbes away from your tea, and back in the compost pile or on your garden.

I like to brew my aerated tea recipes in 20 gallon plastic tubs, unfiltered. Then at application time, I turn off my pump for a few minutes. Then I scoop out all the large chunks and remains, and put them on the garden. Then I dilute the tea from a 1:1 to 1:3 ratio, depending on the crops. Since I can't use a mister or sprayer, because they clog up too much with my high microbial, thick teas, I use a watering can or just a cup and bucket to apply the tea as a foliar/soil drench.

Yay! Less work. I was trying to come up with a filter fine enough to strain out the chunks, but large enough to let the amazon microbes through.

Until some green-hearted genius develops a compost tea bag that is fool-proof, I'll stick to unfiltered tea for now and scrape/hose out the chunks when I get to the bottom. It's not such a bad chore considering all the benefits the garden gets from the teas.

Speaking of tea - my Earl Gray-hot is almost done.

-nita

Hello to all-I'm new.
What about cheesecloth? You could probably reuse it a few times.

My obsession is gardening, and my "other-half" is equally as obsessed with beer making. In the "whole grain" method of making beer, they have the exact same problem with the grain clogging-up the valve when they pour-off the liquid. Cheesecloth worked well, but you have to have it loose enough to allow the liquid to circulate through the mesh. Their better solution is a five gallon bucket with a false bottom. The false bottom is a mesh that is curved up off the bottom of the bucket. He bought his through a beer supply co. and it is made out of plastic. A hole is drilled about one inch above the bottom and he put in a spicket on the side of the bucket. The spicket is attacheted to a plastic tube inside the bucket. The plastic tube bends down through the center of the false bottom, so the liquid is drained-off underneath it which prevents the valve from getting clogged. In beer making the grains are a fairly large and consistant size, so I am not sure how this could be adapted to the making of the compost tea. The false bottom is only a couple of dollars from a beer making supplier, part of what they call a 'mashton'. I don't know if this will help you all any, but so far it has worked for making some pretty fine brew!! I am planting some hops this spring as a link to our mutual obsessions.

I'm guessing that you wouldn't want to be making a brew after running your tea throught that.LOL-bri

No cheesecloth and no filters. Go back and reread what the Captain said.

I recently met a woman who is brewing tea for her 500 acre ranch. She takes this VERY seriously. She buys only worm compost imported from Louisana. Every batch comes with testing results for whatever it is she's looking for in her compost. She filters the compost going into the tea through a 1/8 screen and does not filter at all coming out. Most of worm compost dissolves into her tea anyway. She sprays under high pressure to force any small bits of compost through the hose and nozzle. She also uses a huge nozzle that doesn't restrict the flow much at all.

I get molasses for $1.00 per gallon at a farmer's co-op.

Sierra gal - can you give us the name of the beer supplier he gets his mesh-bottoms from? A web-link or phone # would be helpful too.

Sounds like a great solution to a pervasive issue for the strainers in the crowd.

"Their better solution is a five gallon bucket with a false bottom. The false bottom is a mesh that is curved up off the bottom of the bucket. He bought his through a beer supply co. and it is made out of plastic. A hole is drilled about one inch above the bottom and he put in a spicket on the side of the bucket."

Sounds like a kitchen colander turned up side down over a drain... would that work? They have them cheap at the dollar tree.