Brewing The Liquid Gold Of Gardening : How To Make Compost Tea?
Compost tea has been hailed as the liquid gold of gardening, a magical elixir that makes plants grow faster, healthier and more vibrant. Many gardeners swear by these benefits of compost tea. This concoction of organic matter is carefully brewed to give your soil a boost towards optimum health. If you too are intrigued by the concept and want to find out how to make compost tea for your own garden, we are here to help you.
What Is Compost Tea?
Basically, compost tea is a liquid organic fertilizer for your houseplants, flowers, fruits and vegetables. Compost tea carries within it concentrated nutrients and plant friendly aerobic bacteria, fungi and nematodes. The liquid is a nutritionally rich, well-balanced organic supplement made for your plants by steeping aged compost in water.
Compost tea is a great way to love your plants naturally. This mild liquid fertilizer can be used at any time of the year to boost the overall health of your garden. What is great about compost tea is that you can make your own right at home, with some fresh well-matured, finely broken down compost. If you wish to know more about natural composts then you should look at organic composts.
The Benefits Of Compost Tea
Many gardeners vouch on the efficacy of compost tea in creating a well-nourished garden. Numerous studies published by various university extensions prove that compost tea, when used in conjunction with good gardening habits, produce overall healthy plants. Studies have also shown that compost tea is effective in suppressing pathogens in certain species of plants.
Let’s take a look at some of the reasons why you should be incorporating compost tea in your gardening.
1. Improves Overall Plant Growth
Using nutrient rich compost tea can give your plant lusher, greener foliage, larger, more vibrant blooming flowers and increased size and yield of vegetables.
2. Provides Nutrients To Plants And Soil
The nutrients present in the organic concoction are fast acting and readily absorbed by plant roots through the soil. Compost tea’s chelated nutrients are easily absorbed by most surfaces of the plant.
3. Provides Beneficial Microorganisms
There are billions of helpful microorganisms present in compost tea. These include several species of aerobic bacteria, useful fungi and certain protozoans. These live microbes enhance the overall microflora of the soil with growth of beneficial bacteria. This, in turn, produces healthier, more stress-tolerant plants.
These microbes also boost the immunity of plants against harmful pathogens. When used as a foliar spray, these beneficial microbes coat the surface of the plant leaving no room for pathogens to infect the plant. This protects the plant from blight, wilt, mold and fungus.
4. Helps Suppress Plant Diseases
When a healthy balance is created between the plant and soil, the ability of plants to ward off diseases, pests and fungi improves. Compost tea is known to mineralize essential nutrients and fix nitrogen in plants for adequate use. The microbes present also compete against disease causing pathogens preventing them from flourishing.
Compost tea also improves the growth of mycorrhizal fungi and predatory nematodes, which defend the plants against harmful pathogens.
5. Eliminates The Need For Chemical Fertilizers
This is probably the greatest benefit of using compost tea. Using compost tea will allow you to get rid of toxic chemical fertilizers that harm the environment and surrounding ecosystem. Compost tea combats the negative impacts that chemical fertilizers and pesticides have on your plant.
On top of that you also save money as making your own compost tea is inexpensive and effective.