Nettle and Comfrey Tea

[applestar]

I decided to brew aerated nettle and comfrey tea between AACT. It's not as schedule-driven since I don't HAVE to use it up within a certain time limit

The big white stuff is spun bonded cover I'm draping over the bucket to keep bugs out.

This photo shows how dark green it turns out:


I gave some to the leeks as well as the watermelon and melon patches this morning.

[GardenRN]

ha...until this moment I thought comfrey tea was something you drank lol. Shows what I know. What are the benefits?

[applestar]

All that green so definitely Nitrogen and iron, calcium. Also Potassium from comfrey and micronutrients/minerals as I understand it. (but I'm not "brewing"/fermenting anaerobic ally for weeks until really stinky so maybe not 100%)

Both plants grow deep taproots to bring up minerals from the deep. Comfrey is also said to promote regeneration of cells and has anti fungal properties.

I'm still learning, so I hope more experienced members will chime in.

[rainbowgardener]

Never tried it, but both nettle and comfrey are supposed to be great for your compost pile because of those properties and both of them have been used in medicinal teas for people, so it sounds like it should be good.

I don't brew them, but I do keep nettle when it shows up, so I can add it to the compost pile. And I grow comfrey for tea and the compost pile.

[!potatoes!]

comfrey is amazing. i like it as a green layer in delayed-onset lasagna mulching (haha)...i make a just-comfrey leachate-style 'tea' as well, which is super-concentrated and shows some awesome results on lagging plants of all sorts. to make it, just fill a container (i use a 4.5 gal bucket, but i'd love to have enough comfrey to do more at a time) with chopped comfrey, as much as will fit, all pressed in, and then wait for 6 months or so while most of it liquifies. no added liquid, and there is something of a purely carbon structure to pull out, but then the resulting liquid is so dark green it's almost black and can be diluted quite a bit, depending on the application. it smells NOT GOOD. that's the only drawback.

[nickolas]

I have made nettle, comfrey and manure tea dozens of times in plastic drums 200 litres at a time but i have never aerated any before, what benefits does aerating the tea mix serve?

[soil]

Why are you aeratng it? It works better if you don't aerate it. No energy use either.

My nettles just started up in the patch otl be a little while before I make some

[cmist]

"I have made nettle, comfrey and manure tea dozens of times in plastic drums 200 litres at a time but i have never aerated any before, what benefits does aerating the tea mix serve?"

Typically You Aerate a compost tea -- the aeration serves to create aerobic enviroment

youd add compost , water , and molasis (microbe food source) and aerate for 24 hrs or so and use ---

Yes thers nutrients in the compost used but the main purpose of a compost tea is to provide a large healthy herd of your beneficial micro organisms.


As far as Aerating the comfry/nettle tea, not sure if it promotes aerobic bacterial growth -- but it should prevent fermentation process in the short term?

the other above mentioned method with comfrey is a fermented extract

two different animals

[mattstern]

I'm interested in making plant food from other plants as well. I made a comfrey "tea" last year as you described, just letting comfrey sit packed in a 5 gallon bucket for a few weeks. It smelled so bad I was afraid to use it, so I dumped it on my compost pile. Is that smell normal?

[rainbowgardener]

The bad smell is the result of anaerobic decomposition and I think that you were well to dump it on your compost pile. Some anaerobic bacteria can be nasty. That's why applestar was aerating hers.

[applestar]

Bump for my own purposes, but others might be interested