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Old 01-24-2013, 11:56 AM
CAPT38 CAPT38 is offline
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Join Date: Jan 2011
Posts: 51
Arrow Organic Hydroponic Endeavour

Just wanted to share my plans for my compost tea nutrient

This in short my attempt to produce my own Hydroponic nutrients using compost tea. I understand that this will be trial and error, but I am determined and have a well though up game plan/system that I hope will work. I also would like to thank GPS Frontier for his post on his green house schedule, This is a great Idea and from that, I have come up with a plan to help insure that I have as little problems as possible.
Now I am sure that some of you are wondering, how do you plan to make a compost tea that will be good for both vegative growth and floral bloom. Well I thought about this and the best answer is I'm not!! I am planning to brew both a vegative compost tea and then a compost tea that will be used for the floral Bloom..... I know what you are thinking...Oh yeah like thats going to work.....Well This is where the trial and error is going to take place. I also have come up with a 3 part plan to help cut down on pathogens like E.coli, S.enteriditis, and the Norwalk virus, that are commonly present when growing vegetables.
The first part of my system is one of the key parts and its the compost tea brewer. There are several different configurations that can be use when brewing compost tea, 5 gal buckets are most common in small scale gardening and then there are large commercial models that are avaliable that range to 1000s of gallons. I will be making my own airlift compost tea brewer, but before we talk about that, I want t talk about biota build up ( you know that brown slimy stuff we sometimes find in our systems) Well this stuff is evermore present in organic hydroponics than synthetic hydroponics. Excess biota will clog everything!! Well this is one of the reasons why we flush and clean our systems not to mention it helps to get rid of the bad things that may be lurking in our systems, and it promotes a healthy enviroment for our veggies to grow, which is essential in hydro gardens.

Compost Tea is generally defined as the liquid extract of compost, the concept is simple but the process of brewing compost tea is somewhat scientific. First you need a brewer then some de-chlorinated water, compost, and a few other additives. well we all know how to get the chlorine out of water, but how do you get the pathogens out of the compost? Its simple it has to be heated, to 135F to 150F for 10 to 15 days this is called thermophilic composting will kill any pathogens that the compost may have? No, the heat in the compost pile is cause by microbial metabolisim and kills the pathogens in the process. When hot composting there is a big loss in nitrogen content. Dont worry I am going to add nitrogen to my tea.

Vegative growth:

2 cups of active compost
1 cup of worm castings
1 tsp bone meal ( 6-9-0)
1 tsp humic acid
1 fl. oz fish emmulsion ( 5-1-1 )
1 tsp cal/mag
2 fl. oz. unsulfured molasses
---------------------------------------
Floral Growth
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weeks 1-2 Flush system with h2o2 or liquid lime for full 24 hrs

2 cups of active compost
1 cup of worm castings
2 tsp kelp meal (0-0-15)
2 tsp bone meal (6-9-0)
2 tsp humic acid
2 fl. oz fish emmulsion (5-1-1)
1 tsp cal/mag
2 fl. oz. unsulfured molasses
----------------------------------------
weeks 3-4 flush system with h2o2 or liquid lime for full 24 hrs

2 cups of active compost
1 cup of worm castings
2-3 tsp kelp meal (0-0-15)
2-3 tsp bone meal (6-9-0)
2-3 tsp humic acid
2-3 fl. oz fish emmulsion (0-10-10)
1-2 tsp cal/mag
2 fl. oz. unsulfured molasses
----------------------------------------
weeks 5-6 flush system with h202 or liquid lime for full 24 hrs

2 cups of active compost
1 cup of worm castings
2-3 tsp kelp meal (0-0-15)
2-3 tsp bone meal (6-9-0)
2-3 tsp humic acid
2-3 tsp. seabird gauanno or bat guanno (0-10-10)
1-2 tsp cal/mag
2 fl. oz. unsulfured molasses

----------------------------------------
weeks 7-8 flush system with h2o2 or liquid lime for full 24 hrs

2 cups of active compost
1 cup of worm castings
2-3 tsp kelp meal (0-0-15)
2-3 tsp bone meal (6-9-0)
2-3 tsp humic acid
2-3 tsp. seabird gauanno or bat guanno (0-10-10)
1-2 tsp cal/mag as needed
2 fl. oz. unsulfured molasses
----------------------------------------
weeks 9-10
Just flush with water

Links to DIY Compost Tea brewers:

http://dchall.home.texas.net/organic...DFs/brewer.pdf

http://extension.oregonstate.edu/lan...erplans_2_.pdf

http://soilsoup.com/Plans-for-SoilSo...n%20Brewer.pdf


I plan to make a venturi airlift compost brewer, and the tea will come straight from the reservoir to the drip heads, the buckets will empty into a storage tote reservoir then pumped through a filter/skimmer and then back into the venturi. Ok, why am I going to filter the compost tea? well for 3 reasons the first is to help remove the increasing population of bacteria, fungi and nemitodes. Secondly I plan to keep those microbes and add them to my compost pile so they will continue to breed. Most microbes dont live long so the idea is to keep them multiplying this way I can insure to have the same (good) microbes in every batch of tea. Number three some of the filtered compost will be used as a foliar spray so I really wont need a bunch of microbes on the foliage.
Dont worry i dont plan to leave out the fungi!!! I plan to culture it. Sure how do you plan to do that? Well it actually not that hard, you really dont need a lab with expensive equipment. All that is need is a glass jar some birdseed or some type of grain, karo syrup and a pressure cooker and some agar for isolating the strains of fungi then introduce them to a liquid culture which will last for about a year. But how are you going to tell what strains you have? I have a buddy thats a mycologist.

All comments and ideas are welcome.
Also this plan is to be happening in the near future and none of the steps have be started other than the write up and research.

Links to articles on compost tea in hydroponics:
http://ezinearticles.com/?Compost-Te...ing&id=4856404

http://www.hydroponicsonline.com/blo...roponic-system

http://arboretum.arizona.edu/sites/a...20Research.pdf

http://www.wisconsin.edu/oslp/swrp/R...post%20tea.pdf

http://midwestbiosystems.com/educati...ing-system-acs

http://www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/oc/freepubs/pdf/SA-5.pdf

http://ghex.colostate.edu/pdf_files/beth_succop.pdf

Learn More about what means to grow Organically and be a certified Organic grower:

http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/usda/...av=AGRICULTURE

http://www.gardenguides.com/89747-ce...c-growing.html

http://www.generalhydroponics.com/ge...nicArticle.pdf

Organic foods, are the worth all the hype? That depends if your are conscientious about the enviroment and what you what you put in your body.

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/organic-food/NU00255


Last edited by CAPT38; 01-26-2013 at 08:48 AM.
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