Subject: Re: Regulation of compost teas (was: NOSB loses its head)

From: Joel Gruver <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 Oct 2002 16:23:43 -0400

Hello to all,

I am wondering if anyone has actually experienced increased efficacy of
compost teas after culturing the teas with additives and aeration.

The reason I am a little skeptical is that the great maturity of soil
microorganisms (>95%) are unculturable using all known types of media (let
alone something very simple like glucose).

The addition of sugar and aeration will certainly increase the **total***
microbial population in a tea... however this increase will be selective...
you will shift the microbial community structure of your tea toward microbes
that are highly responsive to sugar and aeration... analogous to shifting a
diverse herbal ley to just a few grass species by fertilizing heavily with
N.

I wonder if this community shift is desireable in terms of optimizing the
disease suppressive (or other beneficial) effect of the tea.

I do not have much personal experience with compost teas and have not yet
done a lit review... but... the soil ecologist in me is skeptical.

If any of you have done on-farm comparisons or replicated research
investigating the compost tea "augmentation" metods that are currently
gaining in popularity, please share your experiences.

Joel

Joel Gruver
Dept of Soil Science
NC State University
[email-masked]

>From: Jeff Lowenfels <[email-masked]>
>Reply-To: Sustainable Agriculture Network Discussion Group
><[email-masked]>
>To: [email-masked]
>Subject: Re: [SANET-MG] Regulation of compost teas (was: NOSB loses its
>head)
>Date: Mon, 21 Oct 2002 08:37:39 -0800
>
>The idea behind compost tea is to increase the numbers of bacteria and
>fungi, protozoa etc in the tea in a short time....say 24 to 36 hours.
>Aeration and sugars increase bacterial counts.
>
>One exception is tea made with NATURAL compost....We have such compost here
>in Alaska. It is made over 10,000 years and has no manures, pesticides,
>fungicides etc......and one of the highest counts of diversified bacteria
>you can get.....up to 35,000 different kinds in a table spoon......You can
>contact me off line if you want to buy some for tea brewers and remain
>organic even if you use the tea within a day of sales......
>
>Still, despite my business, the NOSB rule against sugar makes NO
>sense......
>
>Cheers,
>
>Jeff Lowenfels

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From: Jeff Lowenfels <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 Oct 2002 12:47:25 -0800

Joel, there is a whole list serve of folks who have had positive and
demonstrable experiences. I, for one, have done lots of testing on my lawn
and gardens, with control areas etc.  if you go to Yahoo groups you will
find one on compost teas and can garner that information.

Also, we grow fungi as well as bacteria.....

Jeff L

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From: "Lawrence F. London, Jr." <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 21 Oct 2002 23:37:52 -0700

> Also, we grow fungi as well as bacteria.....

Is it true that the fungi are equally if not more important, ultimately,
that the bacteria cultured in compost tea. The latest SoilFoodWeb
newsletter implies that the sheer mass of fungi generated that further multiply
when in the soil is extremely important for soil health and soil improvement.
Is addition of molasses or the like vital for culturing the fungi or does it
benefit just the bacteria or both?

--
L.F.London
[email-masked]
http://market-farming.com
http://www.ibiblio.org/ecolandtech/pcwiki/index.php/london

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