has55's R & D Journey

Can you use the bags as they are and just have a multiple bag system?

sanderson wrote:Can you use the bags as they are and just have a multiple bag system?

one bag is more than sufficient for making the tea. I just didn't want to hang it up or clamp it anymore. I  wanted to put the aerator in, then the netting and let it drape over the sides to the handle of the brute container, put in the food, then when I'm finished just pull the bag out. This method only eliminated those clamping steps. You know I'm lazy, nothing new there. 
Also, I feel the microbes grow better when they can bounce freely in the water like a California flower child . 

You can make a five-gallon batch, then put it into a larger container of de-chlorinated water like 25 gallons to make a 1 gallon of tea to 5 gallons of water ratio too. I'm just simplifying the steps.
If you add like liquid humus to your water till it dark that means the chloramine has been bound up and now is inert and can't hurt the microbes. Also, you can get liquid humus from your compost by letting the water slowly run thru 2-3 cups of water. the brown extract that comes out the other side of a handheld screen is liquid humus. It's free.
go to 20.06 in this video for the procedure.

Thanks

I took the advice of the USA Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education to plant white mustard seeds in my cucumber beds and was very pleased with the result of no fungal disease as compared to my tomatoes. I will plant it and arugula this fall for next spring preparation and also intermingle it with the tomatoes, peppers and cucumber while they are growing next year. they must be cut back when they bolt, but that easy to do. here are pictures of my cucumbers which are still going strong and the tomatoes which are struggling with the disease. Also next year in the fall. I will apply the Johnson Su compost to the beds and use as compost tea.

Brassicas and mustards

white mustard seeds for cover crops

Cucumbers




tomatoes

Robb, the developer of the aquajet sent some pictures of the aquajet installation and plant results on cannabis.

I removed 2 very green photos.

sanderson wrote:I removed 2 very green photos.

it legal in that state, that why I posted it.

I understand, but I looked through the book and Mel didn't mention it.

sanderson wrote:I understand, but I looked through the book and Mel didn't mention it.

Lol, I guess not.

I like the experiment done by " user_48634" on the dirt doctor forum. Wonderful results.

corn gluten meal

Top 10 Ways Cover Crops Build Soil Health

WOW. It great to see our government embracing soil health and really working hard to see how the biological community works. I thoroughly enjoyed the video. Great info.

has55 wrote:WOW. It great to see our government embracing soil health and really working hard to see how the biological community works. I thoroughly enjoyed the video. Great info.

Right on!  I have used cover crops forever, as did my father and grandfather before me, as a cheap way to boost the soil organic matter, to fight weeds, to prevent erosion, and to attract pollinators.  Before leaving for a month-long road trip, I cleaned out the tomato bed, refreshed it with compost, and planted the Winter Rye/Hairy Vetch cover crop. This is a picture of that cover crop a month later.  After we have some hard freezes, the tops will die back and cover the soil until spring when it will start growing again.

interesting Visual results.

has55 wrote:interesting Visual results.

Most interesting is that the results of the section in 100% compost is totally dependent upon the type & quality of the compost. Is the compost completely plant-based, or does it have manure, etc., included in it?  Is it fungi-based, or bacteria-based? Is it mature compost, or quick-made? Did the compost have rock dust or other minerals added to it during processing?

While the video makes some good points, such as the non-compost section got the minerals and nutrients from the sand & clay in the soil, it doesn't address the addition of, or lack of, minerals in the compost.  For example, when I make a batch of compost in the tumbler, I use not only the kitchen scraps and pine pellets for carbon, but add coffee grounds, rock dust, biochar, and the fermented Bokashi (the Bokashi adds EM and minerals from the bones, egg shells, meat scraps, etc.). When that compost comes out of the tumbler, it looks like rich black soil, and the plants love it.

It would be very interesting, though, to see a similar video with 5 or more sections of pure compost, each using a different type of compost, and document how plants respond to each type of compost.  I will say, though, that over the 50 years or so of gardening with in-soil gardens that no matter how much compost I added to the soil, it never performed as well as the raised beds which have higher and higher concentrations of compost each year. As the video description says, "At least if you have good soil, and you take care of it."  It all depends...

has55, once again thank you for sharing and giving me/us something to think about. I will have to agree with OhioGardener, very little is known about the compost. I have sat in a farmer's workshop on using compost as a soil amendment covering several years and it is possible that over time the nutrient balance or availability can get out of wack. One, I always recommend a soil test, here it is only $12. For this video I would have recommended a leaf analysis so as to know for sure the difference in nutrients of the plant leaves. Then you could state unequivocally the facts. Now there is no science, only noticing the difference in the leaves by observation. Observation is just one step in the scientific process. In growing anything there are so many variables that any observation is a slice in time, pH, moisture, sunlight, temperature just to name a few and to point at anyone of them without taking readings, measurements or running basic tests would make any conclusion suspect.