Compost tea Ph Adjustment Options

So depending on your compost tea ingredients and microbial life the PH of Tea varies. I would like to discuss the different options that exist for safe PH adjustment to teas. Some people complain theire teas are too alkaline for instance 8.0 or others complain their teas are too acidic for instance 4.0

I have heard that humates like fulvic, and humic acid help to buffer nutrients so they can be absorbed across a wider PH range, but wouldn't a tea that is very acid hurt the microheard in the soil if you gave it to a plant with a soil ph of 6.5?

PH Down
Generally speaking acidifying(lowering PH) teas is not a problem. Many just add citric acid, lime juice, vinegar ect.

PH Up
This is where the problem arises. How does one raise the PH of their tea. I have heard of only two ways. Adding baking soda or Bubbling the tea for a day.


Considerations:
So does bubbling(aerating) a tea in fact raise PH?

Are there other options to raising PH such as adding Dolomite lime, hydrated lime, oyster shell flour, or coral calcium to Teas?

Yes most of those are soil amendments but is it plausible to use them for PH adjustment?

Does anyone have any ideas?

i don't worry about the ph of my teas. you are normally brewing teas to increaase microbial population and they reproduce and populate in the tea that you are brewing. humic and fulvic acids do buffer the ph range and are very good to include in the brewing process

I'm wondering if i can put hydrated lime in my compost tea!?!?!?!?!?!?!

beartrapgeorge said:

I'm wondering if i can put hydrated lime in my compost tea!?!?!?!?!?!?!

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I wouldn't.

My mix is well limed and with a very healthy micro herd and it doesn't seem to matter what the pH of the tea is that I use, I see no ill effects.

BUT, a bit of Protekt, a silica supplement from Dyna-Gro, makes a handy dandy pH up. It is very alkaline and will bump the pH of an acidic tea right up. Good for the plant too.

I don't use it as a pH up, per se, and never add more than 1tsp/gallon and usually more like 1/2tsp/gallon. But it is a good, natural (sorta), pH up.

Wet

What do you mean bubble it for a day to adjust pH? Your compost tea should always be bubbling - you want aerobic microbial life not anaerobic.

Your tea should naturally adjust itself to the ideal pH to sustain whatever processes are going on. When you feed with your tea simply mix the tea with your water and other nutes in whatever ratio you desire and then use pH up or pH down till you hit the desired pH.

Yes this will kill off some of the microbes that like the pH to be different but sucks for them and these generally are not the microbes that help plants grow. The microbes in the compost mix break down larger molecules into smaller molecules and then convert the smaller molecules into an ionic form that can be utilized by your plants. Once the material is mineralized you really don't need the microbes - this is how you can have sterile "organic" hydro set-ups.

Adding microbes to break down additional material in the soil is beneficial and will happen even after you kill off the pH discriminate ones. If a microbe can only live in a pH 4 environment then chances are you would never naturally find it in the soils that cannabis prefers.



If you are not aerating your compost tea please stop what you are doing and read more. You can brew bat guano tea and kelp tea with no aeration as you are simply leeching out nutrients into an aqueous solution but compost teas are VERY different. You MUST have ample amount of oxygen at all times to decompose compost in water. Anaerobic microbes can make you quite sick.

best to start with RO H20-_Because it is like yeast and does not like City if you are Muni water.
5Ph is the preferred H20 for tea as the Microbes thrive there. Read it somewhere? Maybe GC bible or the likes of?
Ph down or Buffered Acid is the best and economical as well as dependable and stable solution for lowering your Ph

I use Compost with a pillow case in a 5 gallon bucket and use a small fish pump aquarium air pump balmart for 5 bucks dont forget a 1/4 line to go out of pump to bottom of bucket --4 gallons of ph 5 R.O h20 throw about a 3rd of jar or about a cup of non sulpher Molasses to activate the shit. Viola in about 5 days you will have you starter or tea going. I use a gallon and toss a another gallon of RO H20 to replace and keep it chuggin a summer long.
To observe the life of the microbe use your nose it always knows that fruitiful smell of either too strong it will smell sour and need to be fed molasses. Toss another 6-8 oz in the 5 gallon bucket. wait in 5 days and voila you got tea. Tea does not go bad just re-adjust it You smell it to get em in line. The correct smell is what a horse stable or race track has if you have not been there it is an earthy smell.
Its like having sour dough starter at the house-- but for plants.

hey cali whats in your compost? do you make your own or buy it? Do you add anything else to your tea besides molasses and compost?

i bought a bag of compost w/ cow,chicken manure, ricehulls and other organic matter(mango mulch), do you think i should add anything to it?

I have been brewing my own tea for years... I got a www.Bountea.com 5 gallon kit at my local gardening for a great price, But u can make your own kit. A 5 Gallon Bucket, air stone, nylon paint filter, And whatever kind of tea ingredient's u prefer. I use filtered water, and brew 24 hrs. Then turn 4 gallons into 36 gal. (8-1 ratio) I never have had a PH problem. And depending on what stage your plant is at u can give it what it needs ( Like veg, or between nutrient watering in flower) Great Stuff!! plants love it

i would also like some more info on ph in compost teas. im planning on starting a tea up soon, and using my RO water. the problem is, my RO water is like 8.7ph.
if i were to do a continuous brew, should i ph adjust the water before adding it to the tea?(to get the water level back to where it was)

also, if i were to mix it 50/50 with some water, should i ph adjust that first also?

Luger187 said:

i would also like some more info on ph in compost teas. im planning on starting a tea up soon, and using my RO water. the problem is, my RO water is like 8.7ph.
if i were to do a continuous brew, should i ph adjust the water before adding it to the tea?(to get the water level back to where it was)

also, if i were to mix it 50/50 with some water, should i ph adjust that first also?

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I know this is super old, but having a similar problem. I unfortunately do not have RO water. We have well water and I am dechlorinating for 24 hrs in a 5 gallon bucket prior to feeding or mixing in nuts. The problem is, my water is naturally between 8.1- 8.5. I believe the PH is leading to the phosphorus and calcium deficiencies on this run. Did you ever find an answer to this? Does PH'ing down the water first help to minimize killing the microbes?

cccduncan said:

I know this is super old, but having a similar problem. I unfortunately do not have RO water. We have well water and I am dechlorinating for 24 hrs in a 5 gallon bucket prior to feeding or mixing in nuts. The problem is, my water is naturally between 8.1- 8.5. I believe the PH is leading to the phosphorus and calcium deficiencies on this run. Did you ever find an answer to this? Does PH'ing down the water first help to minimize killing the microbes?

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A lot of folks will offer the opinion that one doesn't have to pH water in a soil system but in my experience it does make a difference. I moved recently and our muni water rums from 9.2 to 10.5 and it was a problem. I would suggest you get it into the mid 6 range before using.

Rufus T. Firefly said:

A lot of folks will offer the opinion that one doesn't have to pH water in a soil system but in my experience it does make a difference. I moved recently and our muni water rums from 9.2 to 10.5 and it was a problem. I would suggest you get it into the mid 6 range before using.

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Gonna see how much recovery I can get out of these. They definitely have some nute lock going on - one worse than others. They're only 23 days old, so hoping they will bounce back and I can cut off most of the affected foliage once they perk up again. I'm gonna PH Down my water prior to adding the compost tea and see how that works. Appreciate the feedback.

In my last hydro grow i put a tea spoon of molases in 60L and the ph didnt want to drop belove 8.0 soo thats one of the options to raise it.and microbes love it

Lime didnt desolve in water i had it for a month in my water it disnt affect ph at all

I know kombucha is somethimes composted soo maybe the juice could be used to ph- it can go as low as ph 2

amneziaHaze said:

In my last hydro grow i put a tea spoon of molases in 60L and the ph didnt want to drop belove 8.0 soo thats one of the options to raise it.and microbes love it

Lime didnt desolve in water i had it for a month in my water it disnt affect ph at all

I know kombucha is somethimes composted soo maybe the juice could be used to ph- it can go as low as ph 2

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I ordered some citric acid that I'll use to lower the PH before adding anything to the water. Gonna let that sit for 24hr with aeration before adding in the compost tea to brew. Hoping that will minimize any affect on microbes. I feel like if it froths up like normal then I'm good. We'll see what happens

You could try adding fish hydrolysate until it’s at the ph you want. The store bought stuff is about 4.5 ph for long term storage and is a really good additive for tea. They use phosphoric acid to ph it as well so it’s available phosphorus(bonus).
Also if your well water is coming from the ground there’s not going to be any chlorine in it but KDF garden hose filters are a cheaper option for water filtration as well. I just used those for a few years before I switched to RO.