Compost tea or Compost tea: Learn how to do it step by step

Hello to all agrohuerters! Given that home compost is becoming more and more important, today we are going to talk to you about another way of doing it called “ compost tea ” or “ compost tea ”.

Compost tea, a new way to make homemade compost. (Source: theprairiehomestead.com)

What is Compost Tea or Compost Tea ?

As we have seen in other articles, compost is the result of the degradation of organic waste under the action of microorganisms. It is used as an organic amendment to improve the physical and microbiological qualities of the soil. It also serves as a fertilizer, providing nutrients to the plant and improving the management of pathogens.

However, when we talk about compost tea, we are referring to an extract of compost water that has been obtained through an aeration process in the liquid phase. In other words, the properties of the compost pass into the water through a process that we will see in more detail below.

ADVANTAGES OVER NORMAL COMPOST

The main advantages of compost tea compared to normal compost are:

Greater application flexibility due to its liquid state. In other words, it will be much easier for us to use it in our orchards since we can include it in the irrigation system or spray it on the leaves.
Compost tea contains a higher concentration of beneficial microorganisms (mainly bacteria) and nutrients. Despite not having much information on this subject, it has been shown that compost tea allows: improving the resistance of plants to diseases, stimulating their growth and better supporting abiotic stress (cold, drought,…).

In the image on the right you can see the difference between normal basil plants and others to which compost tea has been applied.

DISADVANTAGES OF COMPOST TEA

However, not all benefits. We must also highlight some negative things about compost tea such as:

The preservation time. One of the main problems with this method is its short duration to be used. It only retains its properties in the 24 hours following its manufacture.
Obstruction of the irrigation equipment. Sometimes if we use the irrigation equipment to apply the tea, they can become clogged due to some residue that we have not eliminated from our solution.
It should be applied mainly in the growth stage of plants.
If it has not been manufactured correctly, respecting the different temperatures, it may contain pathogenic agents that will end up contaminating our crops.
And finally, we must not forget that the quality of our tea will depend on the compost it comes from. Therefore, if we make compost tea from low-quality compost, our tea will also be of low quality.

MATERIAL NEEDED TO PREPARE COMPOST TEA OR COMPOST TEA

There are multiple ways to prepare compost tea, but in general it is necessary:

Good quality mature compost
Bucket or container where to make the solution
air injection system
Porous bag where the compost will ferment

Material needed to make compost tea. (Source: motherearthnews.com)

HOW TO MAKE HOMEMADE COMPOST TEA STEP BY STEP

1. Remove chlorine from water.

This step is very important and therefore it is recommended to use rainwater as it has less chlorine than tap water. On the contrary, if we do not have rainwater, we can let the water rest for 1 day or oxygenate it between 20 minutes and 2 hours.

2. We add the mature compost putting it in a bag of porous material.

Normally we will mix 1 part of compost for every 4 or 5 parts of water. We will put the closed compost bag in the bucket and add the water. It is important, during the following days, to close the bucket well and stir it for a while during the following 4 days.

3. Addition of additives (nutrients, catalysts, microorganisms,…)

Depending on the effect we want to achieve, other components can be added to our tea.

5. Filtration

Thanks to this filtering we will avoid clogging the irrigation systems of our orchard.

6. Application of compost tea

Application can be foliar or soil. It can be done through pipes, drippers, sprinklers or manual sprayers.

This is all for today, I hope you liked this new way of fertilizing and making crops stronger. If you dare to make compost tea in your gardens, do not hesitate to tell us about your experiences in the comments.

Have a nice day!