Herbal teas are good for us, and good for plants, especially orchids” – says Susan Fairbairn, from a little flower business.
“Fertilising? I’ve never been ‘full monty’ organic when it comes to fertilising.
When I go organic I use seaweed, dried pullet poo and compost teas.
When I’m not I use 20:20:20 and to hell with the salts.
Growing orchids has changed this.
You can’t pour salt over orchid roots. This will cause fertiliser burn.
And It’s a bit hard to get the Osmocote TM to stick to the orchid mount.
It had to be liquid for mounted orchids and seaweed was the organic choice. Which led me to this thought— Healing plants with plants.
Make a herbal tea for plants using…..plants!.
I like it and it’s not new.
Stinky brews made from Comfrey, nettles or aged manure, are old hand me down recipes.
These materials or any combination of were loaded into grandads old sock, ie a hessian bag, and left to putrefy in a big bucket of water.
Once its smelly enough. This sludge was/is watered down to ‘tea consistency’ and poured over plants once a week, doing all sorts of wonders.
So back to the fertilising thoughts. Did I have comfrey or nettle? Not in the tropics in Far North Queensland.
It came back to this.
You can use whatever is available to you.
All plant material contains some water soluble minerals and vitamins and if you use compost it should contain beneficial organisms.
So one thought led to another and to a few dozen science papers and I discovered banana water. Not literally. I tried banana water because I had bananas or was bananas hahaha.
Fermented banana peels contain: potassium, calcium, sodium, iron, manganese, bromine, rubidium, strontium, zirconium and niobium. Potassium was found in a whopping 78.10 mg/g in the above study. [2012 Anhwagne]
So here’s my hand me down recipe for banana water. I don’t ferment for long periods. I use a cold method for extraction that takes 6-12 hours, overnight really. This is the same method as is used in herbalism for making infusions.
Ingredients:
Banana skins – any amount you have.
Water to cover the banana skins.
Method:
- Place the fresh material into a bucket.
- Cover with water. I use rain water.
- Steep for 6 to 12 hours.
- Strain and compost the skins.
Use:
Use at a diluted amount that resembles weak tea and spray on orchid foliage underneath to access stomata. You can also water it onto your potted orchids. I do this every day but I’m bananas. Spray as often as you like, I do
I’m now full monty on organic and foliar fertilising for all of my orchids. Want more tea recipes?
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