Re: [compost_tea] Mature or immature compost for tea?

From: <soilfoodweb_at_aol.com>
Date: Thu, 29 Jul 2004 03:56:37 -0400
When you think of compost to be used for compost tea, you need to consider your purpose in using the tea.  If you are applying tea to soil, use of a fully mature compost is just fine, because the organisms will be put in the soil, and will have plenty of time to wake up, and use the foods as they become available, or as temperature, moisture, etc select for the different populations of bacteria, fungi protozoa, nematodes.

But when making a foliar tea, you want the organisms to be as active as possible, because you want them to glue themselves to the leaf surfaces as soon as possible. 

So, compost for a foliar application should be made, possibly, from a slightly immature compost.  Say, a compost that still is warm, in the maturation phase of the composting cycle, not the fully mature phase. 

>From a worm bin, use worm compost that is just drying down from 70% moisture to 50% moisture, so the fungi are as active as possible. 

--
Elaine Ingham
President, Soil Foodweb Inc.
SFI Corvallis, OR
SFI Port Jefferson, NY
SFI Lismore, NSW, Australia
SFI Hilversum, The Netherlands
SFI Cambridge, New Zealand
SFI Culiacan, Mexico
SFI Jerome, Idaho
http://www.soilfoodweb.com


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Received on Thu Jul 29 2004 - 05:54:34 EDT

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