VERMICOMPOST FOR ORCHIDS

[betoguerrero]

Originally Posted by RoyalOrchids

You produced it!? Are you a worm?



Here we go again... Stronger than what? How do you measure leaf strength? I like Andrew's and Tropic's answers. It can be beneficial - but so is fertilizer. Try it out, but don't count on miracles. Try a side by side with your normal stuff and the worm castings.

Yes I'm a big fat worm and I'm searching the best for my CHIDS....

You can see if a plant has a strong leaf better than the others .... my eyes are the measure of strength...
You're right!!! The best way to find a good fertilizer is trying myself...
I ask if anybody has a experience using vermicompost... so I can begin with those feedbacks...

[Andrew]

The commercial product that I mentioned is OVE's Worm Tea, which is a leachate rather than a true vermicompost tea. There are anecdotal reports of better growth and healthier plants from Worm Tea advocates.
I'm not in the US so I've never tried this product. A few points in comparison to home produced vermicompost products though:
-OVE apparently feed their worms cow manure so the end product is no doubt more uniform than what is taken from the home worm farm.
-OVE supplement the manure with rock dust so it probably has a wider array of micronutrients than what is produced in the home farm. I couldn't tell you whether or not synthetically fertilized orchids are actually being starved of these additional micronutrients other than to say the chemical report provided by my local water company has a very long list of dissolved ions.
-OVE's product is supplemented with Bacillus subtilis. I've had some good experiences with using Trichoderma and Glomus on non-orchid plants so I'm not inclined to see this as a trivial perk of Worm Tea. I am curious to know how much of the reported benefits of OVE's product result from the leachate and how much result from the inoculant.
In saying all of that, most of the orchid growing world does not use this product and that hasn't stopped good growers producing fantastic plants. There are far more important things than which fertilizer you use. It's just that fertilizer is one of the few things growers have any true control over so it gets a disproportionally greater share of the conversation.

[lemonchan]

cymbidyums LOVE vermicompost like... LOOOVEEEE it..

[orchidsamore]

I have been using OVE's leachate for 2 years with excellent results. I believe I was the first grower to use it extensively.

Andrew is correct about the additives in OVE's product. You can not get the same results with home units unless the additives are included in the worm feed. Just adding it to the bed itself does not work as well. The biggest difference is that the home solutions only have a couple of days of shelf life. Home made leachate is still an excellent item.

The compost is not as good for orchids as the liquid leachate. Steeping the compost in water is a decent fertilizer but does not have all the live microbes of the liquid. The compost is fabulous on our vegetable garden.

I usually shock people when I mention that no plant in the world can use nitrogen, phosphorus or potassium. It requires microbes to break down these fertilizers to a form the plant can use. The liquid leachate is these live microbes.

Worms have been helping gardeners grow plants for ever. We know it works, it was only a question of how to use it best on orchids.

Worm tea has a second benefit of containing ceitanese. The only thing ceitanese does is dissolve ceitain. It is harmless to us, children and pets, but fatal to insects which have a skeleton made of ceitain on the outside of their bodies. I have totally eliminated pesticides in my nursery.

I supplement worm tea with Bacillus subtilis GB03 bacterial with is a natural fungicide and gibberelic acid with is a powerful root growth hormone. The three together work wonders.

Here are links with photos of test results that I have achieved.

http://orchidsamore.com/disease%20an...structions.htm

http://orchidsamore.com/disease%20an...%20results.htm

testing is ongoing and new results are amazing me every day.

I soak every re-pot in the triple solution and spray every orchid twice a month with a garden sprayer.

[greenbean]

I have a small worm bin at home and I use the liquid that collects in the very bottom level (there are 3 levels, top is worms, middle is solid compost, and bottom is liquid) to make a fertilizer supplement. I dilute it at about 1 part leachate to 3 parts water (I'm still experimenting with concentrations). I fertilize my orchids with this solution in addition to the regular orchid fertilizer. I've noticed faster growth since starting this regimen, especially with my Paph. 'Macabre', which basically sat there until I started adding the worm solution.

I'd like to hear anyone's opinion on using solid vermicompost as part of a terrestrial mix, especially for orchids like Paphs.

[orchidsamore]

I would recommend it. Paphs do not seem to like much fertilizer so I would watch the amounts.

The compost is a rich fertilizer very heavy in beneficial nematodes. It prevents root cutting nematodes from existing in the same soil. The last lab analysis I saw had 9830 benefical nematodes per gram and zero root cutting nemtodes.

Also worms remove all heavy metals from whatever they consume and the worm compost is 100% certified organic.

[betoguerrero]

do you applicate this leachate to the roots or to the leaves like a folear???

[greenbean]

Me? I apply it to the roots. I've thought about trying it as a foliar spray, but I don't want to try that with things like paphs or phals, because in my climate that's just asking for crown rot. Paphs can come back from that, being sympodial, but I'd prefer not to test mine.

[orchidsamore]

I use the leachate as a soak when I re-pot plants but can not take the time to soak 10,000 orchids on a regular basis.

I use it twice a month as a root and foliage spray. The microbes can be absorbed into the leaves directly.

I never see rot on Paphs or Phals and I spray just before dusk so the microbes are not damaged by UV sunlight. However, I do add Bracillus bacteria to my mix which is a natural fungicide.

[Tropic]

Jerry ... what is this Bracillus bacteria and its source? I am sure we can expand a bit more on this additive.