Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Compost Tea 2.0 Solar Powered


Years ago I bought a small solar panel and charge controller but they sat around and I never put them to use. I want to make compost tea on a regular basis and I don't want extension cord to a fish tank air pump for the 48 hours or so you need to bubble it. So I went to an auto parts sore and got a deep cycle battery and a battery box. I found a device called "Power Bubbles" for keeping fish alive on your boat when you are fishing, It runs on 12 V DC and uses very little electricity. I hooked up the solar panel to the charge controller and the charge controller to the battery. Power Bubbles came with clamps to connect to the battery terminals. Everything fits in or on the battery box. Power Bubbles can drive two tubes with air stones, so I was able to use two 5- gallon buckets.



The picture at the top shows some compost tied into a piece of cheesecloth but I also have recently made a worm bin. My neighbor told me that the CVS sells red wigglers as bait so I went over there and found the fridge that contained containers of red wigglers. I had an old plastic storage bin and some nylon screen and drilled holes in the bin, lined it with screen and fillied it with compost from the regular compost bin, rice hulls and worms.



The worm bin sits on top of a 5 gallon bucket.


When you water the bin to keep it moist, it drains worm compost tea. I added that to my solar powered compost tea bubbler along with some molasses and kelp.



Solar powered compost tea. I have made one batch and am working on the next. The bubbler has been going 24 hours a day for several days now.

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