Are teas a MUST in living organic soil?

DonTesla

Well-Known Member
This is my first run at organic living soil. I have a seedling in a 15gal fabric pot of Coot's mix soil. I don't have a compost tea brewing system so I can not make any teas that require bubbling/aerating. How detrimental will it be for my grow to not use these types of teas?

What I will use is:

Organic coconut water: 1/4 per gallon of water
Fresh, raw aloe vera: 1 tablespoon of flesh per gallon (blended thoroughly); soil feed & foliar
Lactic acid bacteria, EM1, and AEM: 1oz per gallon; foliar spray once a week

Some questions:

1) how often should I top dress with worm castings?
2) how often should I top dress with grounded malted barley?
3) alfalfa meal? do I top dress with that too? how often?
It will only be detrimental if you allow your medium to over dry and kill all your beneficial bacteria / microbes, and have no top dress / protective mulch game planned. 15 gal is a decently darn good size to buffer the medium from drying out too much. 20 or 25 would be better but 15 is much better than 5 or 7.

Seedlings probably shouldn't go into 15 gal containers from the get go, but thats ok, if the environment is dialled in and has full spectrum, it will get going quite quickly, but the more gas exchanges and moist cycles the more often the better, so over watering becomes the danger is all, and therefore lockouts and stunted growth. Its "nailable" but trickier, same time. Although letting beer cups not dry out can be a challenge in a hot climate when plant count is high, too, so to each their own here.

You said 1/4 per gallon of water of coco, 1/4 tsp, 1/4 TBSP, or 1/4 Cup, or 1/4 Litre, bud?
I like coco nut water over SST's and teas, myself, they are clean, simpler, and I also enjoy coconut myself, whereas I dont like to drink SST's but I only use 1 TBSP per gallon, or so, (of pure young coco water)
and no more than once a month.
Less is more, here.

Another chitin boost is insect frass, that is the easiest way to get SST results without brewing soaking rinsing a thing. Staggering number of spores per gram as well.

Also, you can aerate anything with or without a $10 pump from Walmart...simply by stirring 100x each way each day which only takes 1 minute really. IF you did 24 hour brews you would only have to store once or twice really. 36 hour brew, 3 times or so, aka 300x2 manual stirs. 3 minutes total exercise.

However, with that said, I agree with RR et al, that teas are unnecessary and un-ideal, especially if using your own fresh live castings and not being cheap with kelp and neem, and if you have strong fungal/ microbe populations, to begin with.

For me, I would say, if you are growing the herbs to smoke yourself, just watch how much you topdressing with EWC.. commercial or otherwise. I think its best to keep the total volume of castings to under 20%, with 15% being my personal ideal and goal for my own medicine...better burn and better flavour.

As for alfalfa meal, I would only use alfalfa seed sprout tea (vs alfafa meal or pellets etc) during stretch if you do not have COBs to drop down in heights and counter the stretch, yes it may have TRIA hormone but some experimenters believe it can up your leafage too, so it makes for a longer trim and more labour.. I now prefer to keep the calyx to leaf ratio as high as possible and omit the Alf. meal from the soil mix itself.

Your aloe regime looks on point, though, and your labs (lacto bacillus serum) is a good idea too.. it could be used twice daily or once a week, anywhere in there.. more often if you have pests and no other controlling agents to work into your pest management regime.

Just to give you some more viewpoints to ponder. Hope this helps a bit.

DT
 

higher self

Well-Known Member
As for alfalfa meal, I would only use alfalfa seed sprout tea (vs alfafa meal or pellets etc) during stretch if you do not have COBs to drop down in heights and counter the stretch, yes it may have TRIA hormone but some experimenters believe it can up your leafage too, so it makes for a longer trim and more labour.. I now prefer to keep the calyx to leaf ratio as high as possible and omit the Alf. meal from the soil mix itself.
Im wondering about this as well. Seems like my plants are leafier than usual & in the back of my mind after reading this Im starting to think its the alfalfa meal, probably using to much.
 

hillbill

Well-Known Member
Im wondering about this as well. Seems like my plants are leafier than usual & in the back of my mind after reading this Im starting to think its the alfalfa meal, probably using to much.
All things in moderation but a little of many things. My teas for the last several years are very weak but extremely broad. Sometimes backing off on easily accessed nutes make deficiencies disappear!
 

higher self

Well-Known Member
All things in moderation but a little of many things. My teas for the last several years are very weak but extremely broad. Sometimes backing off on easily accessed nutes make deficiencies disappear!
I agree & im learning that as well. Havent made many teas but could make some FPE with the lacto I made. Just been using the alfalfa as an amendment & top dress. Usually I just eyeball the amounts so that’s probably the issue. Im just about out of alfalfa meal anyways & dont think I will get anymore as I have about 7 other amendments to use.
 

Greenthumbs256

Well-Known Member
I made a thread about method of using living organic soil, that proves for a fact beyond a doubt that you can run a living organic cycle and never use a tea not one single time, or any nutrients, or chemicals for that matter. Look it if up you want proof named greens probiotic method

But that being said I still use teas but only when cooking and recycling my soil, isn't a necessity but speads things up.
 

hillbill

Well-Known Member
I have cut back more still and I grow in 5 qts of mix. ROLS gets better all the time.
My castings, Back to Nature Cotton Burr Compost and Black Kow or similar and light reamendments. Love weak Alfalfa/Kelp teas.
 

Rasta Roy

Well-Known Member
Cool , thought on foilar feeding compost? I rotate LAB and Compost tea foilar as a preventative measure for PM
I don't think there's anything wrong with doing that. Unless you need to have your product tested to be sold through a dispensary...there was a commercial producer in my area that had to trash a whole harvest because of bacteria it tested for that came from compost foliar feeds. Unless you know what your state accepts and you are able to test your compost and make sure it lacks any negative bacteria.

Room environment and airflow will always be your best preventative measure against PM tho!
 

Magicbeanz007

Well-Known Member
I don't think there's anything wrong with doing that. Unless you need to have your product tested to be sold through a dispensary...there was a commercial producer in my area that had to trash a whole harvest because of bacteria it tested for that came from compost foliar feeds. Unless you know what your state accepts and you are able to test your compost and make sure it lacks any negative bacteria.

Room environment and airflow will always be your best preventative measure against PM tho!

You are correct, my room is like stepping in to a mini cyclone
 
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