Well, you know, I'm currently dipping water from a spring or catching it from a roof. Even at best, there's going to be straw, twigs and 'clumps' in water I use. It's important to stir preps in clean water, I can readily feel the difference when stirring water that has something other than the preps in it (dirt, pieces of wood, etc) I've always found cheesecloth hard to work with when pouring 3 gallons into a 5 gallon pail. Recently, I"ve been using plastic bucket-sized 'paint strainers,' which are available at most paint stores. Down side of these is that dogs love to 'eat' them. That 'bronze' mesh screen that's in the bottom of many ag-store funnel/strainers clogs too fast. So...the other day I saw a picture of Jennifer Green working in her lab and she appeared to have a very substantial stainless steel filter/strainer that fit right on top of the vessel she was pouring into. Right then I realized I need to look for my filtering supplies in a scientific supply catalog.
Unless, of course, someone has already solved this problem, lo-tech. (Incidentally, when working with fish or kelp, the filler strainer in the Solo often works 'well enough.' -Allan >Allan, > >Scientists think about filtration on the micrometer >scale. That may be the source of the confusion. I >wondered about that, too, but figured she may be >thinking of Whatman filter paper and not the bits of >cheescloth and related items farmers end up using to >"filter" solutions. > >Chris > > >--- Allan Balliett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> Allan Balliett wrote: >> >> > Sorry, Elaine, I cannot understand how you can >> spray unfiltered >> > compost tea. I guess what I'm missing is that you >> are using compost >> > 'socks' that are more failure-proof than mine and >> you simply don't >> > have orifice clogging compost particles in your >> tea? >> > >> > thanks _Allan >> >> We use bags that keep the particles that plug the >> sprayers from getting >> into the tea. That's why knowing the organism sizes >> is important. >> >> Maintain aeration in the sprayers too, so the >> particulates don't settle >> out and make a sludge that plugs things up. It is >> easy to do a little >> air bubbler in the spray tank. >> >> Bruce Elliott at EPM sells a compost bag with the >> right size mesh for >> the compost bags. >> >> Elaine >> > > >__________________________________________________ >Do You Yahoo!? >Send FREE video emails in Yahoo! Mail! >http://promo.yahoo.com/videomail/
