How To Make Compost Tea

A Powerful Liquid Feed For Your Plants

Making compost is key to successful organic gardening. This is an important skill that all gardeners need to learn. As a growing medium in compost, pots, and containers, can be used to start seeds and grow plants. It can be spread as a mulch to fill the fertility of growing areas or used to create new garden beds.

But there is another way to use compost - not in solid, but in liquid form. A good quality homemade compost can also be used to make tea - a valuable fertilizer that can be used to water around your plants or as a leaf nutrient to replenish soil fertility.

What is compost tea?

Compost tea does not seem to be a very tasty drink. But for your many plants - that would be right. Fertilizer tea is a nutritious liquid that is made by mixing the fertilizer you make in your garden with water. It's really that simple.

By combining fertilizer with water, you are basically liquefying the nutrients in the soil. It can be used to give plants a drink.

You may be wondering why not use fertilizer in its original form to fertilize your plants. Well, in liquid form, the plants can quickly absorb the nutrients in the mixture. Like a cup of tea for a man, compost tea will give a quick boost to the plants in your garden.

Making compost

Making a good compost tea starts with making a good quality fertilizer, with a good mix and a balanced nutrient mix. Before we talk about the simple process of making compost tea, let's take a look at the basics of compost making:

Types of compost preparation:

There are a wide variety of different types of compost preparation, all of which you can use to provide the ingredients needed to make compost tea. These include:

Cold compost (in a pile or compost bin).

Hot compost (in a special pot or other heat retainers).

Vermiculture (composting in a container with the help of special compost worms).

Choosing the method or methods of making compost is the first step in making effective compost tea.

Ingredients for making compost:

Making a good compost involves a basic understanding of the different types of materials in a compost pile. Products are generally divided into two types - carbon-rich 'brown' products and nitrogen-rich 'green' products. Both types are needed to produce good quality fertilizer. Brown materials include cardboard, straw, branch material, wood chips, and bark.

Green products include green leaves, grass clippings, and fruit and vegetable waste. To get a good mix in your fertilizer you need to add ‘brown’ and ‘green’ ingredients in thin layers. In addition to thinking about getting the right mix of carbon and nitrogen-rich ingredients in your fertilizer, thinking about making good fertilizer and getting the right balance of essential nutrients needed for plants to grow.

Water and Fertilizer:

Another thing to consider when making good quality fertilizer is the water content of the system. Too much water and composting can become stinky and anaerobic, and ventilation may not be adequate. Too little, and the organisms that help make compost, from worms to bacteria, may die, and the process may not work (or at least not). No matter what type of fertilizer you try, making sure your fertilizer has the right moisture is key to success.

Making compost tea

Once you have made a good quality fertilizer, it is time to turn that crumbling, frying material into a liquid feed. To do this, you need to:

Knead the manure to remove large twigs, stones, or other objects that will not break.

Fill a bucket, can, or another container 1/3 full of this fertilizer.

Fill the remaining container with water. (Rainwater is better than tap water.)

Stir the mixture well.

Let the mixture sit for a week or two until the nutrients soak in the water.

Drain the resulting liquid with a cloth or strainer.

Apply this compost tea to your plants immediately. (It is best to use this filtered liquid immediately or within a day or two so that nutrients are not lost.)