[compost_tea] Biodynamic tea in Saskatchewan

From: Steve Diver <steved_at_ncat.org>
Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 01:21:50 -0000

Greetings from Canada -

Now I am in Saskatoon, Canada, for the
"Organic Connections" Prairie Wide Organic
Conference.

The province of Saskatchewan has the highest
number of certified organic farms in Canada at
roughly 1,200.  Most farms are raising grains,
legumes,and oilseeds on a broadscale, ranging
from 800 acres to 1,600 acres to 4,000 acres.  Some
farms have pastures, hay, and cattle.  Of course
there are small farms raising vegetables, but
predominantly this is broadscale prairie agriculture.

As a result, crop rotations are well developed.

Weed control methods are based on rotations, cover
crops, and specialized cultivation methods such
as blind harrowing and cross harrowing.  

Foliar sprays of a blend of seaweed and fish
emulsion are fairly common among organic farmers.

It has become so common, there are agriculural
research papers on fish emulsion in Canadian journals.

Today we had a talk on Soil Ecology where Dr. Jill
Clapperton was the featured speaker. She is
an excellent resource, and farmers flocked to
ask her questions after the talk.  Among the
many things she talked about was the increased
amino acid content of grains raised via organic
rotations and reduced phosphorus fertilization,
which encourages mycorrhizal formation.

I was brought here to speak at a 3-hour Biodynamics
Workshop.  Michael Schmidt, an established and well
known biodynamic dairy farmer from Ontario, shared
as workshop co-teacher.

Biodynamic compost tea emerged as one of the
leading opportunities for broadscale farmers
to spread bio-dynamics on these large acreages.

Bulk compost applications are simply not feasible
in every instance.    

With biodynamic compost tea you are spreading
biological and dynamic forces onto the land.

To demonstrate wave energy forces, I brought
Tibetan singing bells from India. 

Theodore Schwenk said the wave energy of
a vortex in water is similar to the waves
produced by the sound of a flute.

Using a vortex compost tea brewer may indeed
enhance the energetic properties of water and
microbes during compost tea brewing.

Interestingly, Michael Schmidt hangs Swiss
cow bells around the necks of his dairy cows.
He said that a dome of sound sometimes encloses
the dairy herd when they move across the pasture. 

Vermicompost is the other thing I am suggesting
that farmers look into.  It can be made
in a barn as the winters are long, and it can be
used as a compost tea substrate or mixed with
BD compost as a substrate. 

Fermented plant extracts also came up.

There are many practical ways that farmers
can use local biomass sources and microbial
transformation to enhance biological fertility,
biological control, and farm vitality.

Best wishes,

Steve Diver




Yahoo! Groups Sponsor
ADVERTISEMENT
click here


Yahoo! Groups Links

Received on Mon Nov 15 2004 - 21:03:52 EST

This archive was generated by hypermail 2.3.0 : Tue Feb 07 2012 - 14:15:36 EST