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[compostteas] Compost tea and EM cultures used in aquaponics systems
- From: Lawrence London <lfljvenaura AT gmail.com>
- To: compostteas AT lists.ibiblio.org
- Subject: [compostteas] Compost tea and EM cultures used in aquaponics systems
- Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2012 00:51:52 -0400
Keywords to Google for endless results:
IMO Indigenous Microorganisms
EM Effective Microorganisms (Dr. Teruo Higa)
Korean Nature Farming
Compost Tea
Activated Compost Tea
Aerated Activated Compost Tea
Fermented Plant Extracts
24 Hour Compost Tea
Biodynamic Preparations
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How to Prepare a Beneficial Microorganism Mixture http://www.sbafarmscollective.org/composting-and-bioremediation/how-to-prepare-a-beneficial-microorganism-mixture/ - Make a liquid formula buy mixing in proportions of 1 part mixture to 20 parts water and 0.5 part molasses. After 24 hours it is ready to use. The liquid should be used within two weeks. You can spray it on your veggies and it will be absorbed through the leaves. Spray on a meadow and your animals can benefit from it as well.
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Forgot to mention that Gil Carandang of Herbana Farm in the Phillipines has written an excellent document on making and using a variety
of cultured microbial preparations for use in many aspects of agriculture (probably aquaponics too). Some of his recipes are similar to the
one above, others involve rice, field and/or forest soil, milk, molasses, etc.
Google his name and you will find out more about his research, lectures, workshops and publications.
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Robert Verzola, also from the Phillipines has written another useful document on preparing cultured effective microorganism amendments for agricultural use.
I first found out about his work in the sanet-mg mailing list which we are both subscribed to.
There is a lot of good information and excellent advice in Robert's website
plus a recipe for an IMO preparation which uses cooked rice:
Ecology, technology and social change
Indigenous microorganisms (IMO)
http://rverzola.wordpress.com/2008/10/31/indigenous-microorganisms-imo/
Indigenous microorganisms (IMO)
A new concoction is becoming increasingly popular among farmers. Usually called indigenous microorganisms (IMO), this concoction has been successfully tried by government agriculturists, academic researchers and non-profit foundations alike. They have found it useful in removing bad odors from animal wastes, hastening composting, and contributing to crops’ general health.
To make your own IMO, follow these simple steps:
1. Cook a kilo of rice, preferably organic. After cooling, put the cooked rice in a wooden, earthen or ceramic container. Avoid plastic or aluminum.
2. Cover the mouth of the container completely with cloth or paper, fixed in place with a rubber band, to prevent water or small insects from getting in.
3. Put the covered container, protected from possible rain, under the trees, in a bamboo grove, a forest floor, or wherever a thick mat of leaves has formed. Leave it there for three days.
4. After whitish moldy filaments have formed, transfer the entire contents of the container to a larger glass or earthen jar and add one kilo of brown sugar or molasses, preferably organic.
5. Cover the jar with clean cloth or paper, fixed with a rubber band. Keep the jar in a dark, cool place. Let it ferment for seven days, until it appears muddy. This is your IMO concoction.
To use, mix two spoonfuls of the concoction with a liter of water. Spray the diluted solution around chicken coops and pig pens to remove unpleasant odors, on your compost pile to hasten decomposition, or on your crops to improve their general health by controlling pests and serving as foliar fertilizer.
By making their own IMO, farmers can free themselves from the need to buy inputs for their farms. By reducing their costs, using IMO keeps them away from debt and improves their income.
Truly, these tiny beneficial organisms are a farmer’s friend.
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This entry was written by Roberto Verzola, posted on October 31, 2008 at 8:14 am, filed under Agriculture and tagged Farming, indigenous microorganisms, organic. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Post a comment or leave a trackback: Trackback URL.
Comments:
Roberto Verzola Posted March 31, 2009 at 6:17 pm | Permalink
I haven’t done it myself but I know people who have used it on
chicken and pig manure with very good results. We’ve used it on
household compost and dog poop. The manure must be spread out for best
effect (the greater the surface area of the manure exposed to the spray,
the faster the microorganisms can act on the organic matter, preventing
the creation of foul odors. My wife, who has more experience with IMO,
says to mix 10 table spoonfuls of IMO and 2 spoonfuls of red sugar in 1
gallon of water (1/2 gal. is enough if the manure is wet) and let the
IMO multiply for 24 hrs. That should be enough for 50 kg of manure. I
would add that even a smaller amount would probably work, as the IMO
will multiply rapidly, with the manure as their food.
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Roberto VerzolaPosted April 29, 2009 at 9:27 pm | Permalink
I will ask those who have a lot of experience with them, in case some have tried it on rice hulls, and get back to you. Quick comment: IMO simply help to hasten decomposition. Also, you don’t even need to decompose rice hulls. Some have incorporated them directly to clay soils to loosen up the soil. Others turn them into carbonized rice hull (CRH) — the same process as charcoal-making — before applying them to the soil. But I don’t have much experience myself with rice hull, except for a few days of using them as fuel, with some CRH as by-product.
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Roberto VerzolaPosted May 14, 2009 at 8:19 am | Permalink
Here’s a comment about my quick reply to you, from someone who has had more experience with rice hulls:
You are correct to your answers, at least from my point of view. Rice hulls are decomposed easily when incorporated in the soil. Rice hull helps loosening the soil and keeping moisture. It will be good to spray directly the IMO in the soil mixed with rice hulls to increase its population.
My two cents.
Regards,
ElmerB
It doesn’t have to be aseptically clean or sterilized. Just make it as clean on the inside as a clean kaldero. What we are trying to avoid is gross contamination. We want to collect the microorganisms on the soil surface which hasten decomposition and to culture these. In my experience, you can see these as very thin whitish filaments on the rice. My guess is that the suspended particulates in the air just above the soil surface contain spores, bacteria and various beneficial microorganisms from the soil, and these are what we want to collect and culture.
By the way, there are two different methods of culturing these organisms. The IMO approach is anaerobic (you let the culture and the sugar solution ferment in a closed container). But there is also another approach, which is aerobic. This one uses an air pump (just like the one used to aerate aquariums) in an open container to increase the dissolved oxygen in the solution. I have very little experience with this second approach, but it is also supposed to be quite effective. Search the Web for “compost tea”, if you want to learn more about it. There seems to be an ongoing debate whether the anaerobic or the aerobic approach is better. I would imagine a mix of the two is best.
Greetings,
Obet Verzola
That’s ok. Remember that the IMO will consume all the rice and the final result will look like liquefied mud. Ok lang magpawis ang lalagyan, Huwag mo lang punuin dahil baka umawas. Hindi lang magbabasa, kundi magiging liquid pa nga yung rice eventually. Make it closed para hindi mapasok ng langgam, insekto, etc. but not so airtight na hindi makasingaw ang hangin. Cloth or paper wrapped with rubber band or string around the rim of the container is fine. The fermentation will generate carbon dioxide and high pressure inside the container. Keep on experimenting. Farmers should be experimenters, trying out every idea on a small-scale to test it themselves, before applying the useful ones on a larger scale.
You can treat IMO like the “mother yeast” in wine- or bread-making. Prepare another sugar solution, add a tablespoonful of IMO, and they will keep multiplying.
I don’t have his contact info, but try getting in touch with Prof. Ted Mendoza of the University of the Philippines College of Agriculture in Los Banos, Laguna. I believe he is in the Agronomy Department. He has been doing research on IMOs.
Yes, I know farmers who have mixed IMO in the drinking water for chicken. The effect is a better feed conversion ratio and less smelly manure. I’ll have to ask others about their exact measurements, although I’d say that you can start with 20 parts of water to 1 part IMO, and then experiment by first halving and doubling the concentration (40:1 and 10:1) and compare their effects. If you work with IMO you need to have an experimental mind, because the concept in work-in-progress.
Left to itself, the soil will keep improving its fertility as organic matter builds up. There are two major reasons for loss of fertility:
1. the use agro-chemicals kills or hampers the growth of soil organisms which are the real engines of soil fertility
2. the continuous export of agricultural products from the soil, so that organic matter does not return to the soil anymore but goes elsewhere.
To reverse this loss of fertility, you need to do two things:
1. stop the use of chemicals, to allow the soil organisms to recover
and reproduce naturally. In the case of microorganisms, you can hasten
this by taking some samples of soil microorganisms (usually called
indigenous microorganisms or IMO), putting these in a sugar medium
(molasses for example) so they can reproduce rapidly, and spraying the
IMO back into the organic matter you put on the soil. Doing this,
however, is useless if you continue to use chemicals.
Stopping chemical use is the first and most important step.
2. put back into the soil at least as much amount of organic matter as you take away from it. If for instance you bring to the market 2,000 kilos of rice and 500 kilos of vegetables, try to bring in at least 2,500 kilos of organic matter from the outside to put into your soil.
Greetings,
Re liquid organic fertilizers, pls search the Web for “indigenous microorganisms”, “Korean nature farming”, and also “compost tea”.
- [compostteas] Compost tea and EM cultures used in aquaponics systems, Lawrence London, 10/10/2012
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