• Post Reply Bookmark Topic Watch Topic
  • New Topic
permaculture forums growies critters building homesteading energy monies kitchen purity ungarbage community wilderness fiber arts art permaculture artisans regional education skip experiences global resources cider press projects digital market permies.com pie forums private forums all forums
this forum made possible by our volunteer staff, including ...
master stewards:
  • Carla Burke
  • Nancy Reading
  • r ransom
  • John F Dean
  • paul wheaton
  • Jay Angler
stewards:
  • Timothy Norton
  • Pearl Sutton
  • Tereza Okava
master gardeners:
  • Christopher Weeks
  • M Ljin
gardeners:
  • Jeremy VanGelder
  • Matt McSpadden
  • thomas rubino

What advantage does worm tea or compost tea have over urine?

 
Posts: 274
8
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Both compost tea and worm tea need extra infrastructure to collect or extra time to brew. I make more urine than I can come up with uses for.

Why would I want to put in the effort to get worm tea if I can use urine for fertilizing, foliar feed and to water my compost with?
 
pollinator
Posts: 2392
105
  • Likes 1
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Urine, as it comes from the source, is sterile. If it's not, that means you have a bladder infection. It's pretty much pure nitrogen fertilizer that has no beneficial microbes with it. Worm tea and compost tea are teeming with beneficial microbes, ready to compete with plant pathogens that are trying to get a toehold on your prize vegetables. If you douse your plant with fresh urine (properly diluted, of course), that's going to give the plant a nitrogen boost, but then it is still on its own to fight off microbial nasties that might be lurking. If you add your urine to worm or compost tea, then you have provided lots of good bacteria and other microbes that can squeeze out the pathogens.
 
pollinator
Posts: 4245
Location: Tennessee 7b
353
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
What John said.

Tea=probiotics. You don't need to get too fancy with your brewer, just getting it to be a starter culture is a huge benefit and that only takes an hour or two.

Darrin Doherty talked about not even brewing tea, just applying molasses to feed the microbes already in the soil.
 
If you open the box, you will find Heisenberg strangling Shrodenger's cat. And waving this tiny ad:
Our PIE page has been updated, anybody wanna test?
https://permies.com/t/369340/PIE-page-updated-wanna-test
reply
    Bookmark Topic Watch Topic
  • New Topic