[compost_tea] Re: Defining what is compost tea exactly - NOP dangers?

From: Kirk Leonard <kirk_at_oregonatural.com>
Date: Wed, 11 Jun 2003 19:02:23 -0700


As far as I can tell there are three ways to make compost tea, so I'd
suggest there are three kinds of compost tea. Aerated compost tea (AACT) is
a great new kind. Nutrient teas (NCT) and anaerobic teas (ANCT) are the
other two, both used successfully for a long time, I'm sure. Many
variations are beneficial, as in biodiversity. Doc E and I have talked a
bunch about this. Though we haven't agreed, I am using her most recent
comment, day before yesterday I think, on this parsing.

You can make an aerated tea with a bunch of equipment, a stirred tea by hand
or with less equipment, or a steeped tea with no equipment, plus the buckets
all require:-). All three will depend on ambient oxygen conditions,
aerating or stirring or steeping time, and compost, nutrient and water
content. Marigold tea, nettle tea, dandelion tea, whatever, I agree we
should call them all by name, be they aerated, stirred or steeped.

Aerated Teas maximize aerobic microbial value, Nutrient Teas maximize
nutrients and organic content and are usually aerobic. Anaerobic Teas may
maximize bio-blocks, organic matter or other nutrients and may actually be
beneficial? Could be. Seems so, historically. Each seems to be divisible
by two, additionally.

All three contain microbial and organic content, given they are made from
some kind of compost. "Manure tea" is not an appropriate category because
it can be made with good manure compost, aged manure, dried manure, sick or
wet manure, I suppose. Latter do not sound good but are perhaps approriate
for USNOP.

Manure tea is a great folk concept but not a clear or useful notion today.
It fits in all three categories. Raw manure thinking is obscure and
inappropriate, like USDA: "USDA Organic Processed Manure Materials" could
be downright dangerous, also, and make a very strange tea, so I find NOP
thinking about manure specious. That they have tied all compost teas to raw
manure is even more specious. I have never heard of a tea made from raw
manure, but there might be some, I suppose. Appropriately managed animal
wastes seem always beneficial.

There seems to be two kinds of NCT and ANCT - stirred or steeped - also, as
well as two kinds of AACT - bacterial or fungal. Stirring compost tea
supports aeration so I think a hand or machine-stirred tea can definitely be
aerobic, and all the organism content released, too. Steeping a tea can be
aerobic if it happens at low elevations/cool temperatures, without extra
nutrients, it seems, and the tea will also contain all the original organic
content, depending on hold time. Stirring a steeped tea supports every
critter or critter body getting out there, seems to me too. NCT and ANCT can
have good carbon and nutrient content no matter what. All can be done on
any scale, a true USDA agenda threat... AACT is the greatest threat to
chem-head agriculture, though. Seems like five of these six possibilities
are bound to be beneficial, only a chance of any danger with a stinky
anaerobic tea which can still be safely disposed in a sunny aerobic place,
hmm? Do I need to say if you are paying any attention there is no danger in
either manure or compost tea?

Apart from some new kind of stink, USNOP or natural, we need to know what
kind of harm was ever or is possibly caused by CT, or historic compost or
vermicompost or manure teas, truthfully. I understand a few people have
been sickened by bad compost but I haven't ever heard anything credible
about problems with good compost or compost teas. Someone asked me what the
danger was with compost tea the other day, and I couldn't answer, except to
suppose if you've cultivated pathogens in your compost or tea, which is hard
to do if you're trying otherwise, you could contaminate your lettuce if you
sprayed or poured it on the plants just before harvesting. Has anyone ever
heard of any actual danger or damage or disease from any real world compost
tea? As goofy as these questions may seem, all USDA and NOP may need to do
is concoct questions creating doubt to prevail in their quest to ban CT, as
stupid as that is.

Does anyone besides me suspect this whole USNOP thing on CT and manure is
actually intended to get "processed manure materials" set up ahead of manure
composts and compost tea as good organic stuff? This all fits with USDA's
recent agri-industrial agenda, but I find it hard to accept they could
prevail with such stupidity.

Kirk

WALD, the US long distance phone company, had a great quote of the month
last month: "The job of a citizen is to keep his mouth open." From Gunter
Grass, author.










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Received on Thu Jun 12 2003 - 00:18:17 EDT

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