Care for a “cup of rosy” for your posies? Your plants will love “tea time” when it’s organic compost tea, aka liquid fertilizer! So here we include a compost tea recipe — with or without a compost tea kit, to help you get up and running.
Really, if you wish to increase the health and productivity of your garden, compost tea is very worth the time. It will give your plants a huge boost, and it’s not hard to make and is ready in a day or two!
Liquid organic compost tea will make your plants more disease and pest resistant, and inoculate your soil with 10,000 times as many microbes as there are in regular compost.
Compost tea is the ultimate tonic.
Making Millions of Microbes in 1-2 Days
If you took a shovel of compost and dumped it into a bucket of water, then waited a few days, you’d have a mild elixir (or leachate) of nutrition to pour on your plants. But when you add lots of oxygen, sugars, and other stimulants, as with compost tea, you’re multiplying that exponentially.
The bacteria and fungi will go at it like mad rabbits and begin doubling in population every 7 minutes. Let this brew on for 24 to 48 hours and you’ll have millions of microbes and in tens of thousands of varieties all ready to infuse your garden with abundance and supercharged vitality!
Compost tea inoculates your soil with 10,000 times as many microbes as there are in regular compost.
COMPOST TEA – Part 1
Coleman walks you through how to make compost tea, and includes information on the compost tea kit system similar to what we used. He also covers alternative materials and equipment you can pull together from items you might have on hand.
COMPOST TEA – Part 2
Part 2 of how to make compost tea, 24-48 hours after “cooking”.
Disadvantages of Compost Tea
- Noise – the sound of the aerator droning on for 24-48 hours
- Smell – it is a stinky brew… a bit like rotten fish
Those are the only two disadvantages that come to mind in making compost tea. However, it’s a lot cheaper and better fertilizer than most any organic liquid fertilizer you could buy, so we think those two inconveniences are well worth it for what it gives to the plants..
If you want more oncompost, you may enjoy these articles on how to make organic compost and on compost tumblers and bins..
We brew a new batch every couple weeks. Compost tea won’t keep well, so once you make it you’ll want to go ahead and use it up.
If you’re planning on hopping on the compost tea wagon, welcome aboard and happy brewing! Your plants will love you for it!
Plants Used for Compost Tea
The two most common plants use for compost tea are nettles and comfrey. We’re not currently growing nettles, and we have plenty of comfrey, so that’s what we’re using the comfrey.
GARDENER BEWARE: Comfrey is an amazing plant but unless you get the Russian variety, regular comfrey is known to be invasive and can take over your garden!
We didn’t know that when we first planted ours, but now that we use it regularly to nourish our garden, it all works out. We have plenty of comfrey to use and to share. Comfrey nourishes the garden soil, makes great compost tea and is also used for healing — hence the common name knitbone — and makes a beneficial healing salve with calendula.
The Incredible Comfrey
CAUTION – Comfrey consumption:
⚠️ Can cause liver damage.
⚠️ Is not recommended for vitamin B12 as toxic levels would need to be consumed.
SOURCE: Published study 1983, Briggs, Ryan, & Bell
Here, you can find more on comfrey uses and benefits for you and your garden.
Comfrey Facts:
- Dubbed ‘a miracle herb’
- Mineral rich
- Some varieties can be very prolific (aka invasive)
- Grows easily
- Deep roots
- Thick furry leaves
- Vitamin B12 reports are unproven
Comfrey is an amazing plant whose roots can grow as deep as 20-30 feet! Comfrey’s incredible root system is the reason it has so many nutritional and medicinal beneficial for plants and humans.
Comfrey’s deep roots and big leaves means deep mining for—and storage of—minerals and trace nutrients.
Comfrey Uses
- Green fertilizer (place chopped leaves in your compost or around your plants)
- Compost activator, or as a liquid fertilizer ‘comfrey tea’
- Soluble fertilizer
- Contains copper, beneficial as an antifungal and antiviral plant spray
Comfrey Compost Tea Recipe
- Fill container ~3/4 full with chopped large comfrey leaves
- Add water to the top
- Steep for ~2 weeks until leaves rot (we cover ours loosely with a board
After leaves are rotted:
- Stir then pour half into another bucket
- add water to both to be about double the amount or to a weak tea color
- Pour around the roots of your plants
Simpler Comfrey Compost Tea Recipe
Less smelly, this time-tested process is even simpler. You’ll just need to buy or make a dispensing bucket with a spigot or tap at the bottom, or a top pump that siphons it from the bottom.
- Fill a container with chopped comfrey leaves
- Place lid or weight (we use a couple bricks on top of plywood cutout)
- The lid doesn’t need to be tight but you’ll want to keep it out of the rain
- NO WATER
The leaves should break down in a couple weeks but without the unpleasantly potent odor resembling dead fish. In a couple weeks or so, you’ll have a black fermented comfrey tea concentrate.
- Dilute 1 part comfrey concentrate to 20 parts water for container plants and seedlings
- Dilute 1 part comfrey concentrate to 10 parts water for garden and larger plants
If you have any extra, store in a jar in a cool dark place or refrigerator. Just be sure to mark it as COMFREY for the GARDEN so that no one mistakes it for human food! You can consume comfrey, but carefully, but that’s a story for another day.
Cheapest Way to Use Comfrey to Fertilize Your Garden
If you’re pressed for time or money toward buying the aerator and supplements there’s another, simpler method. It’s not as effect and potent as the compost tea, however it’s definitely beneficial.
You can simply grow comfrey and use the cut up leaves for mulching around your plants and garden beds. You can also place cut comfrey leaves into your compost bins.
And more here on other comfrey uses and benefits.
Wishing you great gardens and healthy harvests!
Coleman Alderson
G. Coleman Alderson is an entrepreneur, land manager, investor, gardener, and author of the novel, Mountain Whispers: Days Without Sun. Coleman holds an MS from Penn State where his thesis centered on horticulture, park planning, design, and maintenance. He’s a member of the Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society and a licensed building contractor for 27 years. “But nothing surpasses my 40 years of lessons from the field and garden. And in the garden, as in life, it’s always interesting because those lessons never end!” Coleman Alderson
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