How do worm tea's work wormtea is microbiology Alive

Worm tea is all about microbiology and they are measured and evaluated under a microscope. Compost, worm castings, EM, and other inoculants all work and are evaluated by this means also. It is the wide diversity and numbers of that define a good tea. Please refer to our April 2006 newsletter for a discussion of why this is important to healthy soil which, in turn, creates healthy and vibrant plant life.

Worm tea suppress disease on plant material and activate and add to the biology of the soil. Perhaps the most widely used and known use of teas is to suppress/eliminate black spot and powdery mildew on roses. By spraying a worm tea on the surface of leaves, you are doing two things. First, you coat the leaf with millions if not billions of microbes all competing for a food source. Some, for instance protozoa, eat bacteria which may be eating decaying plant material. Others eat other microbes and their wastes. In the end, there are not enough resources for the harmful molds and fungi to flourish. In addition, you are also coating the leaf with a protective surface that protects the leaf cells from attack by foreign spores or airborne microbes. Finally, by inoculating the soil, microbes break down nutrients for uptake into plants thereby increasing plant health and the plant’s own disease resistance/suppression.

Wormtea is superior to simple compost teas in the diversity of microbes, the additional substances that worms create, and the reduction or lack of harmful microorganisms. Although a traditional compost pile is a great environmental aid, and its final compost is a great aid to your garden, it typically does not have the microbe species diversity and numbers of worm casts – especially our Barefoot Soil Earthworm Castings – to be an exceptional aid. (Remember, microbial species diversity and numbers are necessary for a more thorough breakdown of the organic matter in the compost.) A tea can only have the species diversity of the starting medium. The only way to circumvent low numbers in your starting compost when making a tea is to inoculate the tea itself during or at the end of the brew with catalysts, i.e. microbe packages! Worms also create substances that act as growth hormones, cell length regulators, anti-aging compounds, and more goodies that just are not available in common compost. Either the brewing or extracting method add these important aspects to teas, and this is the probable explanation of good results obtained by non-aerobic bottled tea that does not have high species diversity and numbers. Finally, compost can also contain E.coli and other human pathogens if not composted properly. In aerobic brewing and with adequate aeration maintenance, E.coli will not survive in the tea, because "there are many other organisms, which in aerobic conditions, grab food away from the E. coli, take up the space E. coli needs to grow, and consume E. coli." (2003, Dr. Elaine Ingram) (An important note here: "If you apply a source of questionable material anytime 120 days before you are going to eat those vegetables without washing them, there’s a possibility that E.coli could still be present, especially if your crop production system does not have adequate aerobic organisms to out-compete the coliforms." (2003, Dr. Elaine Ingram).

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Used with Permission from Yelm Worm Farm.