Last week I chronicled my first baby steps into “Natural” farming or maybe more properly “Korean Natural Farming“. I actually like the term my new favorite non-fiction book, “The Holistic Orchard” uses right in its title. Holistic . For me that word summarizes the approach I’m going to use in my orchard/garden/chicken ranch, not only looking at the whole system but investigating the whole world of agriculture practices. The goal is to keep an open mind and be inclusive not exclusive, if after thorough research I come to the conclusion that an application of petro-chemical based pesticide, herbicide or fertilizer is the right choice that option, while not being the preferred option, will be included.
Back to my funky stuff! The fungus/bacteria/yeast culturing project went off successfully. Karen did find my fungus bin but didn’t throw it out (Lorri did you snitch me out?) Your going to be spared pictures of furry, fluffy, multi colored spotted rice only because I forgot to take a picture before I processed the goo.
Rice Wash water after a week of culturing.
Pulling out 8 ounces of serum with a turkey baster
The Lacto-Baccillus serum mixed with milk to grow out the preferred Lactobacillus cultures
In 2 weeks time this 80 ounces of milk inoculated with 8 ounces of Lacto-Bacillus serum should curdle and separate leaving me with a crude curd to feed to the chickens and Lacto-Baccilus rich whey to be stabilized and used in the orchard.
The funky rice mixed with brown sugar to make IMO-2
IMO-2 ready to ferment
The IMO-2 along with the milk concoction will now go in a dark closet to ferment for a couple of weeks in preparation for stabilizing and then use.
Yuk. And I mean that in the nicest possible way. You’ve done a stellar job at producing quite a bit of yuk so I suppose you should pat yourself on the back – just wash your hands well before doing so
[...] which I outlined my entry into the world of Korean Natural Farming. About a week later my post, IMO aka Indigenous Micro Organisms, outlined the second step in creating microbial rich preparations for application. Today’s [...]