Kashi gone bad? Went from awesome to green funk in last 2 days. Preparing for fungal tea input.

[NewGrower2011]

So I was preparing to use some of the Kashi Blend from build-a-soil to get a fungal tea going and I made a lightly moist mix of malted barley and their kashi.

After a few days I was getting a very nice white fuzz going and left it to sit and grow further preparing for brewing this weekend. Last night I noticed a bit of green coming into things and then checked this morning and there was more. Now this evening it's further appearing and I'm thinking this batch is basically going bad??

Throw it out? And if so, why? Is this green a true indication of bad/undesirable type of fungus taking over? I'm guessing I let it go for too long?

 

[halfbreed421]

It looks like you didnt aerate the tea and it became anaerobic and now non beneficial microbes have taken over. there are many stickies about this topic in this fourm. I could also be wrong because I don't often brew teas but I know that looks scary to me lol

 

[NewGrower2011]

Never made the tea, that's just letting the kashi + barley being allowed to get fungal first.

The plan was to do as some tea recipes mention to first build up your innoculation as fungi takes longer than beneficial bacteria. You can see some threads out in various threads here & other sites where they talk about this type of approach.

First couple days, slow to no activity. Next 3-4 days was great. Then downhill... I think it's a timing thing. Hoping a guru drops by the thread with some real science but I know as the layman that green == bad usually. The barley was from a brewing source so it shouldn't have been a carrier of much. The only other inputs were some EWC+Bu's compost and the Kashi. I was a bit medicated and think I did use the ewc/compost and it looks like that's the case from the brown materials you can see on the walls. Damn stoners.

Next time might try the kashi + barley & some distilled water only. My goal was to multiply what they include in the Kashi Blend (rootwise microbes) and the barley was a good input on its own as well as I believe an ideal food for the fungi.

 

[NewGrower2011]

Well, I just tried breaking it up and man o' man it's THICK. It had thoroughly matted the entire mass.

Now the bad sketchy part... there was some weird ass red fungus growing on the bottom. Spots of and when broken up there were patches of it inside the mass. Now that's past the too sketchy point for me so it'll be going into the trash or the unused grass clipping pile outside that I don't plan to use due to the lawn treatments used. But will watch what happens there 'for science'.

If someone stumbles across this thread looking for info about fungal teas then my advise is no more than 2-3 days to let your input inoculate. I think if I hadn't waited too long this would have been an awesome input for my tea. Whatever they use in that BAS version of Kashi Blend does seem to do very well each time I've tried it and given it the right conditions to thrive.

 

[PadawanWarrior]

Well, I just tried breaking it up and man o' man it's THICK. It had thoroughly matted the entire mass.

Now the bad sketchy part... there was some weird ass red fungus growing on the bottom. Spots of and when broken up there were patches of it inside the mass. Now that's past the too sketchy point for me so it'll be going into the trash or the unused grass clipping pile outside that I don't plan to use due to the lawn treatments used. But will watch what happens there 'for science'.

If someone stumbles across this thread looking for info about fungal teas then my advise is no more than 2-3 days to let your input inoculate. I think if I hadn't waited too long this would have been an awesome input for my tea. Whatever they use in that BAS version of Kashi Blend does seem to do very well each time I've tried it and given it the right conditions to thrive.

Maybe too much moisture. Are you putting a lid on the bucket so it can't get any air? I use the Gro-Kashi from BAS sometimes. I haven't used it a lot though, so I'm curious what's going on with yours. I haven't added it to malted barley though.

 

[NewGrower2011]

Another insight after reading a bit, maybe shouldn't have been breaking it up without a mask on either. Time for the trash bin...

 

[NewGrower2011]

I have a 3 gal bucket and I was getting condensation inside so was staying pretty moist. The lid has tiny little openings so there was airflow (more for venting than intake). I was opening it daily and fanning the lid a bit to circulate fresh air in, but there's 12-24 hrs between...

 

[NewGrower2011]

When I broke things up there's wasn't that much moisture in the mass itself. The lid & sidewalls still had condensation though.

 

[NewGrower2011]

For others sake mainly, some pics...



You can see the small air gaps below, I just laid the lid on loosely to allow some air in/out...



So even with that air gap, I was still getting this much moisture on the lid so it was still having some thermal action. This view also shows better how many air gaps there were around the entire lid. When I put things in I didn't put a ton of water in, but it was modestly damp.