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On top of Brush Mountain, Pa.

For those of you who are still thinking about tomatoes, I am wondering what recipes you are going to be using to make compost tea this next year if you are going to make any at all. The choices to me seem to be a commercial mixture such as that sold by Ron Wallace or you own special mix. If you are going to use your own recipe what do you have in mind? One ingredient will, of course, be water and then some sort of organism mix such as your own special compost, or someone else's, and then some food source for the organisms such as maybe molasses. But which and how much say for a 5 gallon batch? Or maybe just go with what Ron has to offer?

12/20/2018 11:12:05 AM

Pittsburgh, PA

Doesn't get much easier than WOW Wonder Brew. But I do occasionally make my own by filling up an old stocking with compost (which is mostly chicken poop and bedding) and sinking it into a 50 gallon plastic drum with a dual outlet air pump attached to it for a day or two.

12/20/2018 11:29:11 AM

Grittyville, WA

I think will go back to plain old compost. I get how there could be a lack of nutrients but i dont get how there could be a lack of organisms. If you want a rich source of amino acids its going to take a lot of protein. I would experiment with adding high protein 'garbage' to your tea. That would accelerate your results. I think the amino acids is what the plant uses. Good luck. Easy on the nitrogen unless you really want tons of calcium and potassium once your fruit sets it seems to me the fruit can actually can do fairly well without high nitrogen.

12/20/2018 12:19:13 PM

Grittyville, WA

*what not unless

12/20/2018 12:20:37 PM

Grittyville, WA

I would say switch away from any nitrogen as soon as you have a blossom set... There will still be more than enough in the plant and in the soil to grow the fruit. As long as your tea promotes healthy roots use it. For me... thumbs up for wow paks to give them a good start. One per plant again in 2019. Also i might try light concentration of h202 when watering. Bnot is against this but i.m thinking half a percent at most. Probably less much less than that. Whatever helps the roots. I dont really know enough but I do like kicking ideas around.

12/20/2018 12:47:04 PM

Team Canuckle Heads

Bacterial tea: 1 cup worm castings, 1 handful alfalfa, 1 oz. each of seaweed, molasses and humic acid.

Fungus tea: 1 1/2 cups of worm castings in a bowl with 1 tsp. of babies oat cereal sprinkled on top. Put in a dark cupboard that is at least 70° for 3 - 4 days until the fungus grows. Add to bucket with 1 oz. each of humic acid, fish emulsion and molasses.

I brew both for 48 hours and after I stop bubbling add 1 oz. of lacto-bacillus.

Not saying this is right......just what I do.

12/20/2018 3:33:46 PM

Oak Grove, Mn

I am copying that recipe zeke :). Yes, if I find a place to grow this spring, I will be using aerated tea. I have about 30 different recipes to try. Over 1/2 of my top ten tomatoes were grown last summer in a group that I used compost teas that had 10 plants. This is out of a total of 80 plants. 5/10 top ten results using compost tea vs 5/70 with no compost tea. I am trying to decide what brew to use for my winter tomato that just set. I am a believer...yes Brandon, I am not excited about the use of H2O2. Hydrogen peroxide is used to kill microorganisms...I cant see how it could be net beneficial unless you have bad organisms.

12/20/2018 6:27:31 PM

Grittyville, WA

I agree bnot it probably would have no benefit if your soil had a healthy microbiology but if conditions were poor for root growth it could boost oxygen because it releases oxygen... quite a bit actually.

On a side note: A couple of us made mistakes with plastic this year, with the goal of boosting soil temperatures or controlling weeds. But probably the use of plastic limits the amount of good biological activity. It does limit weeds but it limits the air getting to the roots. This was a situation where I think H2O2 would have helped me since I had too much compost combined with plastic.

12/20/2018 9:59:08 PM

Grittyville, WA

Sorry to clarify I put plastic around one of my pumpkins not a tomato. The roots were visibly damaged and the plant was not healthy.

12/20/2018 10:17:32 PM

Team Canuckle Heads

I did the same thing last year Bob. Main focus was on CO2.
I had 1 set with just CO2, 1 with just tea and one with both. Plants with both were the best by far and the one with CO2 alone wasn't far behind the one with tea. Long and short mine get both from now on.

12/21/2018 9:44:24 AM

Hot West Tennessee

I have been watching trials of compost teas as part of a early and late blight program. Very interesting.

12/29/2018 11:33:39 AM