Re: [compost_tea] what favors what

From: Ted Peterson <ted.peterson_at_tcsn.net>
Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2004 20:21:37 -0800

what favors what----- Original Message -----
  From: Gail Raby
  To: compost_tea_at_yahoogroups.com
  Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2004 6:51 PM
  Subject: [compost_tea] what favors what


  Quote/Clip: Grasses favor bacterial tea. Woody plants favor more fungal=
 tea.

  The following has been quoted many times on this forum--along with some o=
ther plant
  favorites, primarily veggies if I remember correctly.

Hi Gail:

The quote was supposed to be very general. The generalizations are made ba=
sed on textbooks and other sources and are based on what the plants need fo=
r food. The soil biology that feeds woody plants and trees differ from gra=
sses in that they are higher order feeders and need a soil biology that can=
 break down elements required for the tree or bush. Here is what I suggest=
 you do:

For starters, you can look at something as basic as the Sunset "Western Gar=
den Book". I have several other botany books I resource and some microbiol=
ogy books also. You can look for a text by Mark Coyne: "Soil Microbiology:=
 An Explatory Approach. It's pretty complete and basic enough to be unders=
tood by us laymen.

If you haven't done so, you should be building a library of textbooks and p=
lant/animal (zoology, microbiology, plant biology, etc.) books. Text books=
 are great because they have a wealth of data and can be picked up cheaply =
at yard sales. If you go to a college bookstore or a store that specialize=
s in these type books, you will pay $80 - $200 depending on the book. Chec=
k library sales and yard sales in your area.

Look on the internet.

Go to your favorite search engine and type in: "plants and fungi" or "soil =
fungi" or "plant biology" etc. The possibilities are endless and you can h=
ave a lot of fun doing research this way. If you find a site you like, boo=
kmark it or stick it in a folder under Favorites (if you are using IE). =
 

You have a list of plants. Type in the plant name with "care of" or "requi=
rements" at the end. You search query will be something like: Mandevilla=
 care of. If you are not experienced in searching, you can get a lot of ga=
rbage. If you type in: Care of <plant name> you will get a bunch of listin=
gs for "care" and will have to really look for the plant you are interested=
 in getting data about.

Try different search engines. Google, which has resourced about a billion =
pages, has only examined about 1% of the total pages available on the inter=
net. Try Alta-Vista or Yahoo or . . .

Have fun.

Greenhouses. I do have some experience with both organic and conventional =
greenhouses. Because of the nature of greenhouse food production, I haven'=
t found where I can successfully fit ACT into a program that would fit the =
requirements of the growers. In the ornamental market, we have three major=
 ornamental growers close to where I live. One is an Orchid grower who shi=
ps internationally. I approached them with the concept but got negative fe=
edback in the sense of pathogen transferral. At the time I talked with the=
m, I didn't have the answers I needed to allay their fears. I do now.

Commercial growers use all kinds of chemicals to get plants to bloom and wi=
thstand shipping and last in stores. I think that ACT may not totally fit =
in with existing programs and there is currently little guarantee that it c=
ould replace them with equal benefit costwise. I will have to wait and see=
 if we can get a test project and report on that when I get the results. I=
'm not overly optimistic.

I had a friend who tried ACT on some herbs that he had in a kind of patched=
 together greenhouse and he said he couldn't tell the difference between th=
e ACT plants and the plants he fed with chemical fertilizers and the plants=
 he didn't feed at all. So????

Ted Peterson
Earth-Wise/Spirit of the Earth



Received on Thu Jan 15 2004 - 00:21:43 EST

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