Re: [compost_tea] Comments mixed into Chis notes.

From: Robert Norsen <bnbrew_at_yahoo.com>
Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2004 13:15:27 -0800 (PST)

Some I hope useful comments mixed in below - Bob

chris reid <reidchris_at_earthlink.net> wrote:
After having read Bob's post about continuous brewing (I think I got the
gist Bob but need to reread to get it all), and having been poking around in
the archives, I am puzzling over a couple of ideas for different ways of
making tea and hope those with some insight or lots of brewing and testing
experience will give some feedback as to whether this is all winter snow
storm thinking or perhaps there are some possibilities here.

I found an old post from Elaine that as I recall talks about diluting a brew
that's gone anaerobic with very cold water. How much cold water (percentage
of total brew) would it take to bring enough oxygen into the brew to help
it? Would it make sense to remove some amount of tea (since there will be a
ton of B reproducing like crazy - reduce that number some) AND add the cold
water? And when I say "add cold water", I'm thinking serious gallons of
water here, maybe up to double. (Be kind - I have no concept of what it
would take -- just want you to know I'm not thinking a couple of quarts of
ice cubes). I guess the amount it would take to turn the brew aerobic would
depend in part on the water temp and in part on how much food was there --if lots of B food, maybe it would only postpone the inevitable of going
anaerobic again. Scenario - DO2 says its going too low. (without a DO2 check there will be no clue that it is going anaerobic until later when it stinks ) Is there room in the brewer for cold water? Maybe ice cubes are the only way to drop temperature enugh to slow the Bacterial growth. Cooling will slow the growth rate down to where the Aeration rate will exceed the DO2 demand. I think a more practical solution is to add lots of air and keep it going until the food is reduced. Lots of air is available from any vacume cleaner set in blower mode. Used vacs are available that will stand by for this use for maybe $ 25 or less at a garage sale. clean and oil the motor. Put on the long extention "wand'. This I have tested. It works.

I'm wondering if you could preserve the F by adding oxygen to
rescue/preserve the aerobic condition, and who cares if a few B and F are
lost in the process? Better than losing all the F, and the B will be bahck,
sure as Schwarzenegger. So, could this work? Could enough oxygen be added?
Or could it only work in cases where the food was almost run out anyhow? It will be noisey and it may take an hour or more to run the brew low on food. without a DO3 meter I don't know how one would know when any of this is going on.

Stepping away from rescue mode and retiring the firefighting stance for a
moment, I'd also like to ask if it would be possible to modify the concept
of CACT to brewing ONE batch of tea.

I'm wondering if we could create a foolproof (hah!) tea making method by. I think your key word fool,begets a NO.
gradually adding more and more water as the brew progresses. Stick close to a recipe or develope your own with DO2 and SFI testing to be as foolproof as it gets. .
      This might work best in a Bob type brewer where the container size and brew. size can be varied.- " It always works best in a Bob's." (GRIN)

      The idea would be to add the water in steps, diluting concentration
successively as the organisms grow and thus adding oxygen, cooling the water
temp
      Would it help to avoid anaerobic crises?
      Would it be a deliberate way to cause and assist the brew to run out of
food before it runs out of oxygen?
      Make a safer method for the home user who is less likely to test tea?

The value of the method --if it can work -- may be for small-volume brewers. I don't see an advantage yet. I'll keep thinking about it.
and home brewers who are not able to test. Logistically, it might be a bad
idea for those who are going to transport and add water carrier on site. I
haven't seen a drip irrigation operation so can't envision the implications. Had an idea for drip irrigation with ACT. It seems the very slow addition of water and tea to the plant area that is basic to drip has the problem of small nozzles being blocked by ACT particulates. In other systems like drain field systems to get the entire field to work, not just the inner most part of it, they use a PULSE system. Intervals of heavy flow, intervals of no flow. Metering pumps can be set to do this. Pump water and ACT to the system in pulses rather than slow & steady.

Do I understand it right that what we usually try to do is cause food to be
the limiting factor by limiting food? Right. That is what causes the 'typical DO2 curve to rise and flatten out at the end of a brew. We have anaerobic conditions if
there's too much food for the amount of oxygen and available -- in other
words, if oxygen becomes the limiting "ingredient", Why? because of high
water temps or inadequate AIR pumps reducing/not optimizing oxygen available or
number of B reproducing rapidly or both). Both. Too much LIFE for the DO2 avalable. The brewer recipe is supposed to adjust the potential LIFE to the DO2 provided by the brewer.

I realize this does not address the amount of inoculum that the compost
represents. Yes the recipe must allow for the compost. We ty to guess on the safe side. This is a nother good reason to have and use a DO2 meter.
***
This idea I guess is a kind of "broken cookie" gambit. Did anybody ever
tell you as a kid that the broken cookies are all the same to your stomach
and taste as good? Well, idea being, we are going to add a water carrier to
this tea for application anyhow, so why not add oxygen as an ingredient in
the form of water? The tea will "taste the same" in the soil regardless of
how many gallons of water carry it there, or when the carrier is added. It makes a big differnce when you are applying ACT to K acres. If the water is going on from an irrigation system the brewer and trucking only has to handle the ACT. On pivot systems this may be 1000 to 1.


If we can reduce the likelihood that an anaerobic tea will be produced by
the novice tea maker without access to DO and disinclined or unable to use
lab testing, then it will be much more widely accessible.
Repeat - no DO2 meter, no SFI - tea maker better stick by the recipe. Better a little less of the right kind of life in the ACT.
So, even if the theory is all wrong, the last sentence contains what I
consider to be a good goal... I have a feeling Elaine is going to tell me I
have no concept of how much oxygen the biology can demand when it's growing
rapidly, and that she will recall folk tales of the little Dutch boy trying
to hold back all the water of the sea...or perhaps she will next send me to
a lake with a cooking utensil (slotted spoon)..when she sends us, we can build sand castles and collect vitamin "D". You bring the cookies? Bob

Chris Reid





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Received on Tue Jan 13 2004 - 17:20:14 EST

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