Worm castings add nutrition, organic matter and soil building microbiology
Soil Food castings add nutrition, organic matter, amazing soil building microbiology, and more when you add them directly from the bag to your garden, lawn or pot. If you really want to kick off the beneficial soil microbiology, brew a tea made from castings and CHLORINE FREE WATER. Chlorines job is to kill bad microbiology. Unfortunately it kills the good guys too. Tea is also a extremely effective pest deterrent when sprayed on leaves of plants.If you don’t have rainwater or filtered water it’s no biggie. Just let your water directly from the tap, sit in the sun for a full day. Chlorine will off gas in that time and the water will be perfectly fine for your microbes to thrive.
If you want to make straight compost tea, the same recipe applies.
NOTE: microbiology is alive and needs oxygen to live. Be sure to use your brew within 4 hours of removing it from the air pump. If it smells terrible it’s dead/anaerobic – don’t use stinky castings or tea. Tea should have little smell once the fish emulsion is eaten.
View our worm tea recipe here.
Vermicompost also known as Worm Castings, have virtually no smell and are an effective insect repellant. Vermicompost or worm castings are inoculated with the enzyme chitinase from the digestive tract of the worm. This enzyme degrades chitin, which is the substance comprising most insect exoskeletons. Sprinkling castings on the soil around the base of plants, especially seedlings, provides an effective deterrent to soil dwelling insects. Spraying a tea made from worm castings on plants is an effective insect repellant against sucking or chewing insects. We have sprayed vermicompost tea on blackberry bushes, peach trees, roses, hibiscus, as a Japanese Beetle deterrent and have had great success saving most of our fruits and flowers for several years. Happy Sunday!