Here in the UK, we have been slow to catch on to Compost Tea. Perhaps that’s because the big companies cannot sell it, as the microbes in the tea become dormant after a few hours without oxygen, or nutrients. This renders it much less effective, so no sales. Small suppliers of brewers cannot create a market. One garden centre has been offering the tea for sale to it’s customers at £3 per litre. The link below is to their website, and describes their product.
http://www.cleevenursery.co.uk/page.php?id=10
A simple search for {compost tea brewer} will produce quite a few hits, but a UK only search will not give very much information.
Plans for brewers a relatively simple to find, but most of them are for simple “bucket bubblers”. They are simple to make, and will be fine for a small garden. Be sure to get your ingredient quantities right, as there is little room for error in such a small container.
A good site which gives good information about compost tea, and describes how to construct a simple brewer can be found by using the link below.
http://www.finegardening.com/how-to/articles/brewing-compost-tea.aspx
The best place for researching recipes is the compost_tea forum, which can be accessed from the Blogroll. You have to be a member to read posts. Many of the contributors, mainly based in North America, have gone on to produce their own brewers for sale. More complicated plans can be found, but it is important to ensure that the combination of container size, oxygen level, and ingredient quantity is right.
I will be adding some general guidelines in due course.
