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Subject: Compost Teas: 24 hour, EM, IM, BD & fermented plant extracts

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  • From: "Scott Alexander" <daylily AT bigpond.com>
  • To: <compostteas AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [Compostteas] More on Fungi & Keeping Teas
  • Date: Sat, 25 May 2002 10:01:27 +1000

 
When I lift the hay mulch the springtails are there by the 1000's, so I'm wondering if I
should put that hay in the "hay teabag" and a couple of kg's of soil from
the top two inches of the soil in the "compost tea bag" and thereby
"capturing" lots of fungi. Once extracted they can then feed on the humic
acid, seaweed and rockdust  in the tank. Am I on the right track???

Elaine replied -
I'm confused.  Hay bags?  Soil in the compost bag?  
 
Hi Elaine and the CT Group - OK, lets start again. I have huge cultivated beds in which I grow my daylilies. The soil must very very fertile and have a pretty good soil food web because I plant a daylily piece the size of your thumb and a year later there is a huge clump with 10 to 12 divisions in it. I mulch with organic hay between the rows and if I disturb the hay when digging plants, there are lots of springtails. So - I deduce, there could be lots of fungi in the top 2 inches & maybe some in the hay? If not, then maybe protozoa in the hay? I have a bag with alfalfa and hay hanging the brewer - is this not acceptable?
 
Is it not a good practice to have soil in the brewer? It has never blocked the spray equipment.
 
Another thing. When I dig a daylily I often see a dozen or more worms around the roots and crown. Doesn't this mean they are feeding on the micro-organisms which have gathered there?  So . . . if I was to dig up a plant with a football-size ball of soil and place this in a bag in the tea, wouldn't the microbes from it be extracted? They certainly would be indigenous and wouldn't they be the "right" ones?  The root growth three to four months after planting is quite phenomenal and from this i deduce that there must be billions of beneficials in that root ball feeding off the root exudates and feeding the plant as well. It is always difficult to shake the soil off the roots, so from that i deduce that there must be a huge population of microbes gathered there.
So in the brewer there is a bag of compost, a bag of vermicast, a bag of rock dust, a bag of alfalfa & hay, and a bag of old forest litter and old wood chips which have fungi threads in it, plus - kelp, fish, humic acid, fulvic acid, molasses, and saponim. Now how could e. coli get in there?
I don't think I mentioned it in the information I sent SFI with the last batch of tea that there was a daylily plant - leaves, roots and all - in a bag in the brew. Maybe it helped to build up the bacteria (Total = 983) and fungi (Total = 18.8)? Maybe it had no value at all?
 
A lack of springtails doesn't mean no fungi.  Lots of other critters eat fungi.  Some recent work by Andy Moldenke suggests that enchytraeids eat fungi.  As do sow bugs, and earthworms, and beetle larve, and millipedes and centipedes and .....  a zillion other critters in the forest floor.  Low springtails may just mean someone else got there first.....
 
That's good news! My next test will show fungi totals = 30 !?!? (VBG)
Bad news arrived yesterday. The Dept of Ag authorities in the state of Victoria have just passed legislation which will prevent me sending plants to my clients down there unless my farm is inspected regularly by the Queensland Ag Dept and seen to be rust-free. When rust appeared for the first time in Australia in my nursery,  Quarantine closed me down for two months. During that time I negotiated with Qld authorities to allow me open again without having to dump tons of chemicals on the land, to experiment with alternative fungicides, and to select cultivars which would show  resistance to the disease over a 12 month period. From these cultivars I could begin a breeding program in the future and hope to develop new cultivars which were also very resistant. 
 
Rust only develops on the above-ground parts of the plant so our mail-order plants were cut back to within half an inch of the crown and dipped in a fungicde.
 
The "alternative fungicide" was compost teas of course. I had a hell of a job trying to get them to understand just what a CT was! I then pointed them in the direction of Soilfoodweb website and gave them a copy of the article in IPM Practitioner Sept 2001 "Compost Tea for Organic Farming and Gardening". 
 
During the past 6 months I have been applying a tea concentrate to the foliage in an acre plot and on the other 5 acres the remainder of the brew (50 gallons) has been spread through the overhead irrigation system. In the one acre plot I am seeing much better resistance to the disease than elsewhere although it is probably too early in the experiment to be sure about anything.  I have other smaller experiments in progress with CT as well and I'm reasonably certain it is preventing the rust spores from entering the leaves (If I had unlimited funds, I'd be testing, testing, testing!)
As you can imagine, I am very disappointed with their decision. As expected, it was made by bureaucrats who:-
know nothing about daylily rust (and who have been "got at" by my competors?),
have not discussed my experimental program with me,
have not been in touch with the plant pathologists in the USA who are doing research,
and who have forgotten that I had already sent approx. 20,000 plants to clients in their State just prior to the detection of rust in my nursery. In other words, "the horse had well and truly bolted"
This is one law I feel sorely tempted to break but I shall think of something before Monday when i shall confront our State authorities. Why don't i use chemicals?  I am an organic farmer and there is a condition in the lease of this land that no chemicals are to be used.
 
Scott

 



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